206 pages
Published 2022 (some portions originally published as Gebrauchsanweisung für den Wald in 2017, translated by Jane Billinghurst)
Read from November 24 to November 25
Rating: 3 out of 5
I received this book from my partner R for Yule last year, and it's been migrating up and down my to-read stack ever since. It’s the perfect time of year for a read like this, though. Late November is when the forest winds down for the year. Even when atmospheric carbon makes for 80⁰F days, the leaves are mostly gone, the few that remain plinko-ing down bare branches. It's a time to think of spring, to meditate on the life that we (as a species) have not yet managed to eradicate.
This book is shallower than I’d hoped, but charming nonetheless. It rambles through sensory experience, brief anecdote, and science tidbit, very much like a gentle walk through the woods. It’s clearly directed at a general audience, the sort of readers who maybe have a vague fondness for nature but haven't spent much time in forest themselves. The “In Closing” section summarizes Walking as an “appetizer.”
I can’t tell whether it’s because of this intended audience, because of translation, or because most of the book is written in second person, but at times Walking’s voice is reminiscent of 1950s primers for young readers. Here’s a sample line: “Does it sound odd to you that tree roots breathe?” There’s just a smidgen of “kindly uncle welcoming the nieces and nephews to the family cabin” condescension in there. (I recently got a copy of my childhood staple, The Stars by H. A. Rey, so perhaps that’s why the 1950s association is so vivid right now.) The result isn’t as informative as one might hope from the subtitle, but makes a nice way to wile away the dim hours after November sunset.
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