PASTORAL SONG: A FARMER'S JOURNEY.

New York: Custom House, 2021. 294 pp, 8 1/2" H. "As a boy, James Rebanks was taught by his grandfather to work the land the old way. Their family farm in England's Lake District hills was part of an ancient agricultural landscape: a patchwork of crops and meadows, of pastures grazed by livestock, and of hedgerows teeming with wildlife. But by the time James inherited the farm, it was barely recognizable. The men and women had vanished from the fields; the old stone barns had crumbled; the skies had emptied of birds and their windblown song. (This) is the story of an inheritance, one that affects us all. It tells of how rural landscapes around the world were brought close to collapse and of how the age-old rhythms of work, weather, community, and wild things were lost. And yet this elegy from the northern fells is also a song of hope - of how, guided by the past, one farmer began to salvage a tiny corner of England that was now his, doing his best to restore the life that had vanished and to leave a legacy for the future. This is a book about what it means to love and have pride in a place and about how, against all odds, it may still be possible to build a new pastoral - not a utopia, but somewhere decent for us all." Book and dust jcket are Near Fine. . Not Signed. First American Edition. Hard Cover. Near Fine/Near Fine.