Going with the flow of nature

Robert MacFarlane is a well-known Cambridge University scholar who has written several books on the theme of the fragility of nature and its relentless spoliation in the service of extractive and profit-seeking corporate interests enabled by complicit state authority.

- SHYAM SARAN

His latest book blends together travel writing, biography, and science to create a compelling narrative about the umbilical cords that connect humanity to the natural world it inhabits.

The title of the book presages what follows—the notion that life animates the rivers, mountains, forests, and the oceans around us, that they cannot be treated as inanimate entities or pieces of material property that may be subjected to division or exploitation by their "owners," whether individuals, companies, or governments.

Throughout the book, he treats the river as a living entity, with its own peculiar temperament, its own changing moods, and living and dying as any animate being.

Once we acknowledge that the river is alive, then our whole relationship with it changes, and there is hope that we may be able to conserve what is left and to revive what has been lost.

Mr. MacFarlane has divided his book into three parts, each recounting his journeys along three rivers in three continents.

The first is the Rio Los Cedros flowing through a pristine rain forest in Ecuador in South America, both of which are threatened by plans to mine gold in the area.

The author's account is permeated with an abiding sense of wonder at the myriad forms of life that the river supports, and which, in turn, are protected by the lush forests.