Class hierarchies definitely inflect how we relate to the natural world. Do you think there is something to the idea that all around the world, those who have access to nature, or “pristine” wildernesses, are often higher up on the class ladder? You write: “It took me years to work out that this glorification of falcons was partly down to who got to fly them.” It made me wonder if class hierarchies hadn’t been imposed on nature itself. Peregrines are considered finer birds than goshawks, and falconers nobler than austringers. I found one of the most enlightening aspects of your book to be the discussion of the way class systems arrange everything into hierarchies, even within a pursuit as obviously aristocratic as falconry. After that, all those different genres start to crash into one another, converse with one another, crumble, and get reworked as the book goes on. Then there’s a chapter of grief memoir, and shortly after that one about the writer T.H. The book starts with a chapter that’s fairly straight nature writing. One of the things the sudden death of a loved one does is shatter the narratives that you tell yourself about the way the world works. I wanted more voices in there, to try and capture the sense that there are many different ways of looking at the world around us, and how thankful we should be for that.īut there were other reasons, too. Partly because I was getting impatient with the usual nature-writing mode, that of a single (usually male) mind walking out into the wilderness and explaining it to the reader. I wanted to mess with our familiar genres. Apart from the 'nature' section, I’ve seen it shelved in 'family,' 'biography' and 'hunting' sections and, on one memorable occasion, the 'self-help' section.Īnd yes, the structure was very much planned. Macdonald: It was! The book is a hybrid of several different genres - grief memoir, nature writing, literary biography - and that has caused booksellers quite a bit of confusion over how to classify it.

How did the unusual structure of the book come about? Was it intentional? But the book can be found in the Nature section at Barnes & Noble. CP: At the center of this book is the story of losing your father and how you handled your bereavement.

Author of h is for hawk