The Plot
A Biography of My Father's English Acre
Published on 1. July 2010
Book
Paperback/Softback
304 pages
978-1-84708-144-5 (ISBN)
Description
Madeleine Bunting is one of the most high-profile commentators in Britain. Her father was deeply conservative, with romantic, old-fashioned views about England. After his death, and wanting to understand him better, Bunting began to explore his passionate, lifelong attachment to a small plot of land in North Yorkshire. Delving deep into the rich history of this acre, she uncovers traces of its Neolithic inhabitants and of the Cistercian monks; she learns of the medieval battles and considers the changing face of agriculture and leisure. The result sheds a fascinating light on what a contested, layered place England is, and on what belonging to a place might mean to all of us. The Plot is an original, heartfelt and deeply political book.
Reviews / Votes
An intriguing and elegant chronicle of a wild and woolly patch of England ... Bunting is on finest form dealing with recent history, particularly when she exposes the modern "cultural myth of the rural idyll" and the very English idiocy of preserving this view while the environment dies. Her scholarship ultimately produces a persuasive argument for a more potent sense of place in rootless, mobile Britain * Sunday Times * Bunting's exploration of the relationships between place and people is wide-ranging, researched with great intelligence and richly supported by detail * Guardian * A startling, willed, one-off book ... What she sets out to do is to look at the acre of land "in the middle of nowhere", with scholarly zest, until it becomes no longer a nowhere but a somewhere, known and minutely understood. She is an exemplary guide ... Her greatest achievement is to work a single acre to produce a more general portrait of England ... Above all, she questions what belonging is and discovers that it is about "commitment rather than possession" * Observer * Madeleine Bunting's multidimensional chronicle is among the very best pieces of non-fiction to have been published in a long while about what it is like to be English -- Simon Schama * Financial Times * Madeleine Bunting writes angelically about a place that embraces so much history -- Nicolas Bagnall * Sunday Telegraph * Delightful and fascinating, it also includes a particularly excellent chapter on the many unexpected medieval uses of sheep * Metro * Well researched and beautifully written, Bunting's story builds, stone by stone, to offer a historical narrative about England, an environmental analysis of the effects of industrial agriculture, and a meditation on belonging -- Jo Littler * Guardian * Madeleine Bunting in her haunting and supple book The Plot offered what she called a biography of an English acre" ... Bunting sought to discover its significance in her family history and, inseparably, the cross-winds of English history that have shaped it * New Statesman *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Dimensions
Height: 196 mm
Width: 130 mm
Thickness: 25 mm
Weight
307 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-84708-144-5 (9781847081445)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
10/2009
1st Edition
GRANTA BOOKS
€11.99
Available for download
Person
Madeleine Bunting was for many years a columnist for the Guardian, which she joined in 1990. Born in North Yorkshire, Bunting read History at Cambridge and Politics at Harvard. She is the author of The Model Occupation: The Channel Islands under German Rule, 1940-45, Willing Slaves: How the Overwork Culture is Ruling Our Lives (both published by HarperCollins) . The Plot won the Portico Prize and was shortlisted for the Ondaatje Prize. Madeleine left the Guardian in 2013 to concentrate on her writing. She lives in London with her family.