The story behind The Lost Words (2017) by Robert MacFarlane, and illustrated by Jackie Morris, is a sad one for lovers of language whose childhood was steeped in nature. In the mid-noughties the Oxford Junior Dictionary, while modernising its lexicon, dropped words based on their lack of concept to young minds of the day.
The Lost Words, then, is an attempt to summon those abandoned by way of ‘spells’, short acrostics riffing on words from nature, like lark, weasel, and ivy, that capture the wonder of the meaning behind those words. The effect of these incantations is to call back nature, not to summon but to recognise it once more.
From ‘acorn’ to ‘wren’ the natural world is explored. The beauty of the dandelion, despite its unfair billing as ‘Bane of Lawn Perfectionists’ is rediscovered in old names, like Evening Glow, Milkwitch, and Windblow. The heron (“wreaked from blue and beaked with steel”) has a militancy balanced with its wisdom. The idea of a conker as a work of art that no artisan (“Never. Not a chance. No hope at all.”) could ever craft.
It’s not just evocations of lost words, but invitations to seek out and be in nature. In ‘adder’ we see clues left of its presence. Although the ‘willow’ will “never whisper to you”, there’s no harm in listening. And encouraging a “run to the riverbank” in a dream of being an otter as “you’ll only ever spot a shadow-flutter”.
The accompanying illustrations by Morris show these lost words in their habitat. The images span the sizable pages of the book, often double-page spreads sans words. And each word’s title page with stylised images hinting at the detail overleaf. Birds in hedgerows; a newt at swim in its watery expanse; a moor of fiery heather populated by hawk and hunted hare.
The observation of the artist should be what the child sees today to understand the world around them. If these words are being lost, this is a call to arms for rediscovery. As cities unfold like ‘fern’ across the landscape, nature is still there on the fringe: (“Bramble is on the march again/Rolling and arching along the hedges, into parks on the city edges.) The connection to “bowls of bright blackberries” needs reinstated.