James Rebanks, who, as well as being a successful author, farms sheep in the Lake District, once travelled to the Vega Archipelago off the coast of Norway just below the Arctic Circle, where he met a ‘duck woman’ called Anna. She was working on a remote island of rock and seaweed isolated in a vast seascape, where she practised the ancient tradition of eider farming. So fascinated did he become by Anna and her extraordinary, solitary and independent occupation, that seven years later, feeling adrift and disheartened in his own work, he wrote to ask if he could visit her on the eiderdown island to experience the spring season of down harvesting.

This is his account of that season, of the fierce landscape, the unforgiving elements, grindingly hard labour and farming traditions carried on for centuries. It is through Anna, an old woman by then, and her dedication to the eider ducks, that he comes to understand not only the techniques and practices of harvesting the down, but the extraordinary bond that develops between the wild birds and those who care for them.

I became spellbound following the progressive activities, beginning with discarding old nests and building new ones, watching for the birds’ arrival, protecting them from predators, tending the nests and, lastly collecting and cleaning the down after the chicks have hatched and returned to the sea with their mothers. It’s perhaps one of the very few farming traditions where precious materials can be harvested from wild animals, not only without harming them, but through caring devotedly for their welfare.

The indomitable Anna provided the inspiration for Rebanks to rediscover the values of friendship, loyalty and devotion to a cause. And he, in this totally absorbing and beautifully written book, offers us the same gift.

Reviewed by Anne Green

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

James Rebanks is a farmer based in the Lake District, where his family have lived and worked for over six hundred years. His No.1 bestselling debut, The Shepherd’s Life, won the Lake District Book of the Year, was shortlisted for the Wainwright and Ondaatje prizes, and has been translated into sixteen languages.

His second book, English Pastoral, was also a Top Ten bestseller and was named the Sunday Times Nature Book of the Year. Heralded as a ‘masterpiece’ by the New Statesman, it was shortlisted for the Ondaatje prize, and longlisted for the Rathbones Folio prize and the Orwell Prize for Political Writing.