
Is a River Alive?
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Narrated by:
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Robert Macfarlane
About this listen
Brought to you by Penguin.
From celebrated writer Robert Macfarlane comes this brilliant, perspective-shifting new book – which answers a resounding yes to the question of its title.
At its heart is a single, transformative idea: that rivers are not mere matter for human use, but living beings – who should be recognized as such in both imagination and law. Is a River Alive? takes the listener on an exhilarating exploration of the past, present and futures of this ancient, urgent concept.
The book flows first to northern Ecuador, where a miraculous cloud-forest and its rivers are threatened by goldmining.
Then, to the wounded rivers, creeks and lagoons of southern India, where a desperate battle to save the lives of these waterbodies is under way.
And finally, to north-eastern Quebec, where a spectacular wild river – the Mutehekau or Magpie – is being defended from death by damming in a river-rights campaign.
At once Macfarlane’s most personal and most political book to date, Is a River Alive? will open hearts, spark debates and lead us to the revelation that our fate flows with that of rivers – and always has.
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Is a River Alive?
- By: Robert Macfarlane
- Narrated by: Robert Macfarlane
- Length: 10 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Robert Macfarlane brings his glittering style to a profound work of travel writing, reportage, and natural history. Is a River Alive? is a joyful, mind-expanding exploration of an ancient, urgent idea: that rivers are living beings who should be recognized as such in imagination and law. Macfarlane takes listeners on three unforgettable journeys teeming with extraordinary people, stories, and places: to the miraculous cloud-forests and mountain streams of Ecuador, to the wounded creeks and lagoons of India, and to the spectacular wild rivers of Canada.
-
-
Beautiful
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-
The Old Ways
- A Journey on Foot
- By: Robert Macfarlane
- Narrated by: Robin Sachs
- Length: 11 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this exquisitely written book, Robert Macfarlane sets off from his Cambridge, England, home to follow the ancient tracks, holloways, drove roads, and sea paths that crisscross both the British landscape and its waters and territories beyond. The result is an immersive, enthralling exploration of the ghosts and voices that haunt old paths, of the stories our tracks keep and tell, and of pilgrimage and ritual. Told in Macfarlane’s distinctive voice, The Old Ways folds together natural history, cartography, geology, archaeology, and literature.
-
-
A perfect pairing of prose and narrator
- By chris on 11-05-12
-
Landmarks
- By: Robert Macfarlane
- Narrated by: Roy McMillan
- Length: 8 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Landmarks, a fascinating exploration of the relationship between language and landscapes by Robert Macfarlane, read by Roy McMillan. Words are grained into our landscapes, and landscapes are grained into our words. Landmarks is about the power of language to shape our sense of place.
-
-
Buy the book
- By Kindle Customer on 08-08-17
-
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- A Deep Time Journey
- By: Robert Macfarlane
- Narrated by: Matthew Waterson
- Length: 12 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hailed as "the great nature writer of this generation" (Wall Street Journal), Robert Macfarlane is the celebrated author of books about the intersections of the human and the natural realms. In Underland, he delivers his masterpiece: an epic exploration of the Earth's underworlds as they exist in myth, literature, memory, and the land itself.
-
-
Wonderful book, disappointing narrator
- By Clare Woods on 07-05-19
-
The Wild Places
- By: Robert Macfarlane
- Narrated by: Simon Bubb
- Length: 9 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Are there any genuinely wild places left in Britain and Ireland? Or have we tarmacked, farmed and built ourselves out of wildness? In his vital, bewitching, inspiring classic, Robert Macfarlane sets out in search of the wildness that remains.
-
-
Magical
- By Jennifer on 01-27-22
-
Peak Human
- What We Can Learn from History’s Greatest Civilizations
- By: Johan Norberg
- Narrated by: Andrew Cullum
- Length: 15 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
All golden ages are marked by periods of spectacular cultural flourishing, scientific exploration, technological achievement and economic growth; yet no two are the same. Their beliefs, societies and place in the wider world all vary. Despite this, all previous golden ages have ended, whether it be because of external pressures or internal fracturing; too much hubris or too little wariness.
-
-
The consist threads that knit the central theme.
- By C. D. on 06-11-25
By: Johan Norberg