Richard Mabey Library – serie

During the early 1970s Richard Mabey explored crumbling city docks and overgrown bomb-sites, navigated inner city canals and car parks, and discovered there was scarcely a nook in our urban landscape incapable of supporting life. The Unofficial Countryside is a timely reminder of how nature flourishes against the odds, surviving in the most obscure and surprising places. Originally published in 1973 this landmark book was described by Iain Sinclair as 'a proper reckoning, the Domesday Book of a topography too fascinating to be left alone.' This beautiful new edition forms part of the Richard Mabey library, published to celebrate the author's 80th birthday and has a cover by the artist Michael Kirkman.

In 1987 the Great Storm that ravaged southern England felled millions of trees, and prompted a reappraisal of the arboreal in our lives. In Beechcomings Richard Mabey set out to uncover our relationship with trees, and specifically the beech, their significance in nature and meaning in folklore. First published in 2007 this book was widely praised and described by Kathleen Jamie in the Guardian as 'Refreshing, droll, politically alert, occasionally self-mocking, he has the enviable ability both to write historical overview and also to slip into the woods like a dryad, bringing us back to the trees themselves.' This new edition forms part of the Richard Mabey Library, published to mark the author's 80th birthday, and includes a cover by the artist Michael Kirkman.