Paul Kingsnorth

Everyone knows the date of the Battle of Hastings. Far fewer people know what happened next. Set in the three years after the Norman invasion of 1066, THE WAKE will tell the story of a fractured band of guerilla fighters who take up arms against the invaders. It is hung carefully on the known historical facts about the almost forgotten, decade-long war of underground resistance which spread across England in the decade after 1066. It is a story of the collapse of certainties and lives; a tale of lost gods and haunted visions, narrated by a man of the Lincolnshire fens bearing witness to the end of his world.

The Wake

The stunning new novel from the prize-winning author of The Wake. 'Come to a place like this . . . and you will understand soon enough that this world is a great animal, alive and breathing.' Beast plunges you into the world of Edward Buckmaster, a man alone on a west-country moor. What he has left behind we don't yet know; what he faces is an existential battle with himself, the elements and with something he begins to see in the margins of his vision: some creature that is tracking him, the pursuit of which will become an obsession. This is a vivid exploration of isolation, courage and the search for truth. Short, shocking and exhilarating, it confirms Paul Kingsnorth as one of our most daring and rewarding contemporary writers.

The Beast

A provocative and urgent essay collection that asks how we can live with hope in “an age of ecocide” Paul Kingsnorth was once an activist—an ardent environmentalist. He fought against rampant development and the depredations of a corporate world that seemed hell-bent on ignoring a looming climate crisis in its relentless pursuit of profit. But as the environmental movement began to focus on “sustainability” rather than the defense of wild places for their own sake and as global conditions worsened, he grew disenchanted with the movement that he once embraced. He gave up what he saw as the false hope that residents of the First World would ever make the kind of sacrifices that might avert the severe consequences of climate change. Full of grief and fury as well as passionate, lyrical evocations of nature and the wild, Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist gathers the wave-making essays that have charted the change in Kingsnorth’s thinking. In them he articulates a new vision that he calls “dark ecology,” which stands firmly in opposition to the belief that technology can save us, and he argues for a renewed balance between the human and nonhuman worlds. This iconoclastic, fearless, and ultimately hopeful book, which includes the much-discussed “Uncivilization” manifesto, asks hard questions about how we’ve lived and how we should live.

Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist and Other Essays

After moving with his wife and two children to a small holding in Ireland, Kingsnorth expects to find contentment. Instead he finds that his tools as a writer are failing him, calling into question his foundational beliefs about language and setting him at odds with culture itself.

Savage Gods

On the Unmaking of Humanity

Against the Machine

Told in multiple voices which recall the archaic language of The Wake, Alexandria is set one thousand years into the future, and inhabits a similarly watery landscape to that explored in Kingsnorth's debut novel. Set many centuries after societal collapse and global meltdown, it is about a small, isolated community of survivors who in some respects are living in a futuristic Dark Ages. Out there, on the perimeter of their safe environment, they know there is a Stalker. His arrival into their world - which is both pre- and post-lapsarian - introduces a chaotic new reality as they are introduced to the idea of Alexandria: a virtual place of refuge, security, and comfort from the dangers of planet that has gone into meltdown. Alexandria blends the best of literary, historical, and sci-fi fiction forms to create a whole new genre suited to the post-Anthropocene world. It is a visionary novel that is both timely and timeless, and belongs in a rich Faber tradition going back to Graves, Golding, and Hughes.

Alexandria

The Battle Against the Bland

Real England

Paul Kingsnorth was once an activist, an ardent environmentalist. He fought against rampant development and the depredations of a corporate world that seemed hell-bent on ignoring a looming climate crisis in its relentless pursuit of profit. But as the environmental movement began to focus on 'sustainability' rather than the defence of wild places for their own sake and as global conditions worsened, he grew disenchanted with the movement that he once embraced. He gave up what he saw as the false hope that residents of the First World would ever make the kind of sacrifices that might avert the severe consequences of climate change. Full of grief and fury as well as passionate, lyrical evocations of nature and the wild, Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist gathers the wave-making essays that have charted the change in Kingsnorth's thinking. In them he articulates a new vision that he calls 'dark ecology,' which stands firmly in opposition to the belief that technology can save us, and he argues for a renewed balance between the human and nonhuman worlds. Provocative and urgent, iconoclastic and fearless, this ultimately hopeful book poses hard questions about how we have lived and should live.

Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist

Rebecca Solnit

Bill McKibben

Robin Wall Kimmerer

Terry Tempest Williams

Winona LaDuke

Glenis Redmond

The best political essays from Orion Magazine

The Most Radical Thing You Can Do

Confesiones de un ecologista en rehabilitación

Sarah Hall

Graeme MaCrae Burnet

Fiona Mozley

New legends for modern times; sprung from our ancient lands, stories and stones. 'Marvellous and menacing.' Daily Mail 'The shadow from which I thought I had unshackled myself has returned. Whether this Horror is real or merely the handiwork of my imagination I cannot say. Nor can I say which of these possibilities disturbs me more.' from 'The Dark Thread' by Graeme Macrae Burnet From the legends of King Arthur embedded in the rocky splendour of Tintagel to the folklore and mysticism of Stonehenge, English Heritage sites are often closely linked to native English myths. Following on from the bestselling ghost story anthology Eight Ghosts, this is a new collection of stories inspired by the legends and tales that swirl through the history of eight ancient historical sites. Including an essay by James Kidd on the importance of myth to our landscape and our fiction, and an English Heritage survey of sites and associated legends, These Our Monsters is an evocative collection that brings new voices and fresh creative alchemy to our story-telling heritage. 'Nobody believes you when you talk about the whispering. Oh, Monny, you are funny, they say, you've such an imagination. There's a lot they don't believe.' from 'The Hand Under the Stone' by Sarah Hall The atmospheric locations: Edward Carey - Bury St Edmunds Abbey Sarah Hall - Castlerigg and other stone circles Paul Kingsnorth - Stonehenge Alison MacLeod - Down House Graeme Macrae Burnet - Whitby Abbey Sarah Moss - Berwick Castle Fiona Mozley - Carlisle Castle Adam Thorpe - Tintagel Castle

The English Heritage Book of New Folktale, Myth and Legend

These Our Monsters

From the 2014 Man BookerPrizelonglisted author comes an impassioned journey to the heart of the Global Resistance Movement. It could turn out to be the biggest political movement of the twenty-first century: a global coalition of millions, united in resisting an out-of-control global economy, and already building alternatives to it. It emerged in Mexico in 1994, when the Zapatista rebels rose up in defiance of the North American Free Trade Agreement. The West first noticed it in Seattle in 1999, when the World Trade Organisation was stopped in its tracks by 50,000 protesters. Since then, it has flowered all over the world, every month of every year. The 'anti-capitalist' street protests we see in the media are only the tip of its iceberg. It aims to shake the foundations of the global economy, and change the course of history. But what exactly is it? Who is involved, what do they want, and how do they aim to get it? To find out, Paul Kingsnorth travelled across four continents to visit some of the epicentres of the movement. In the process, he was tear-gassed on the streets of Genoa, painted anti-WTO puppets in Johannesburg, met a tribal guerrilla with supernatural powers, took a hot bath in Arizona with a pie-throwing anarchist and infiltrated the world's biggest gold mine in New Guinea. Along the way, he found a new political movement and a new political idea. Not socialism, not capitalism, not any 'ism' at all, it is united in what it opposes, and deliberately diverse in what it wants instead -- a politics of 'one no, many yeses'. This movement may yet change the world. This book tells its story.

A Journey to the Heart of the Global Resistance Movement

One No, Many Yeses

The stunning new novel from the prize-winning author of The Wake. 'Come to a place like this . . . and you will understand soon enough that this world is a great animal, alive and breathing.' Beast plunges you into the world of Edward Buckmaster, a man alone on a west-country moor. What he has left behind we don't yet know; what he faces is an existential battle with himself, the elements, and something that he begins to see in the margins of his vision ... Beast is a vivid exploration of isolation, courage, and the search for truth. Shocking and exhilarating, it confirms Paul Kingsnorth as one of our most daring and rewarding contemporary writers.

Beast

Dougald Hine

The Dark Mountain Manifesto

Uncivilisation

It could turn out to be the biggest political movement of the twenty-first century: a global coalition of millions, united in resisting an out-of-control global economy, and already building alternatives to it. It emerged in Mexico in 1994, when the Zapatista rebels rose up in defiance of the North American Free Trade Agreement. The West first noticed it in Seattle in 1999, when the World Trade Organisation was stopped in its tracks by 50,000 protesters. Since then, it has flowered all over the world, every month of every year. The 'anti-capitalist' street protests we see in the media are only the tip of its iceberg. It aims to shake the foundations of the global economy, and change the course of history. But what exactly is it? Who is involved, what do they want, and how do they aim to get it? To find out, Paul Kingsnorth travelled across four continents to visit some of the epicentres of the movement. In the process, he was tear-gassed on the streets of Genoa, painted anti-WTO puppets in Johannesburg, met a tribal guerrilla with supernatural powers, took a hot bath in Arizona with a pie-throwing anarchist and infiltrated the world's biggest gold mine in New Guinea. Along the way, he found a new political movement and a new political idea. Not socialism, not capitalism, not any 'ism' at all, it is united in what it opposes, and deliberately diverse in what it wants instead -- a politics of 'one no, many yeses'. This movement may yet change the world. This book tells its story.

Part personal journey, part manifesto, part rallying cry to anyone who would identify themselves as 'English', Real England offers a snapshot of the country at a precarious moment in its history, while there is still time to save its future from the forces of globalisation. Book jacket.

How a force that’s hard to name, but which we all feel, is reshaping what it means to be human In Against the Machine, “furiously gifted” (The Washington Post) novelist, poet, and essayist Paul Kingsnorth presents a wholly original—and terrifying—account of the technological-cultural matrix enveloping all of us. With insight into the spiritual and economic roots of techno-capitalism, Kingsnorth reveals how the Machine, in the name of progress, has choked Western civilization, is destroying the Earth itself, and is reshaping us in its image. From the First Industrial Revolution to the rise of artificial intelligence, he shows how the hollowing out of humanity has been a long game—and how your very soul is at stake. It takes effort to remain truly human in the age of the Machine. Here Kingsnorth reminds us what humanity requires: a healthy suspicion of entrenched power; connection to land, nature and heritage; and a deep attention to matters of the spirit. Prophetic and poetic, Against the Machine is a spiritual manual for dissidents in the technological age.

Ben Okri

Lydia Millet

Sjón

"The following stories by Lydia Millet, Sjon, Paul Kingsnorth, and Ben Okri explore the theme of apocalypse from past, present, and future perspectives. Through the grief of extinction, the gift of second sight, the fatal temptation of technology, and the final notes of human history, these four writers usher us into the mystery of what lies beyond an ending."--book cover flap.

Paul Kingsnorth

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