Laurence Rose is a writer, conservationist and composer. He has worked for the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds since 1983, and since 2017 has helped run a £7 million species recovery project, Back from the Brink. His recent book The Long Spring was published by Bloomsbury in March 2018.
Laurence Rose travelled to India to hear first-hand accounts of indigenous people’s special relationships with the wildlife around them. The Warli people living in the urban forests of Mumbai and the Maldhari pastoralists of Gujarat live harmoniously alongside some of the allegedly most dangerous animals in the world. In Mumbai, it is the leopard, living at the highest density of any urban big cat population. In Gujarat’s Gir forest, it is the endangered Asiatic lion, which preys on the herdsmen’s prized buffalo. Rose delves into the values and practicalities that govern life among India’s big cats, discovering that even the tiger is revered as much as it is feared.
Conservationist Laurence Rose spent two years exploring the cultural roots of our relationship with the rest of nature in order to map out its future. From the magnificent white-tailed eagles of Orkney and Mull to the fascinating world of ants and crickets on the southern heaths, he describes his encounters with wildlife in exquisite language and vivid detail.
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Laurence Rose spent the spring of 2016 travelling from North Africa to the Arctic coast of North Norway. It was a unique exploration of nature, culture and conservation, and the vital sense of place that cements them together. Each place comes alive through vivid language and finely detailed observation, whether describing landscapes, people or the stunning wildlife of the continent of Europe. Free shipping if bought with Framing Nature.
Rose is excellent on the science that underpins our understanding of migration, but if he is an environmentalist by profession he is a musician by vocation. His ear for the sounds of birds is exceptional, while his ability to render their spring songs in precise language is among the foremost pleasures of the book.
No book has made me want to sprout wings and fly quite like Laurence Rose’s modern classic as it chronicles nature’s progress from winter slumber to verdant awakening in language so beautiful it sings.
As a detailed primer to the world above our heads, The Long Spring makes for an inspiring, eye-opening read.
A great source of hope in the sometimes doom-laden world of nature conservation is the spectacular success of some of...
On 3 June 2022 I met with two friends and occasional collaborators, Peter Sheppard Skærved and Edward Cowie, on the...
My three recent books all started with an overarching idea, followed by months of detailed observation, research and writing. Since...
I am currently writing and researching a new book, planning a research visit to India and working on various collaborations with other artists who are inspired by nature.
In my new role as an in-house writer for the RSPB's Species Recovery Unit, I returned to India to research the catastrophic crash in vultures, meeting two key figures in the story.
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Whether it's a brief view of a woodcock against the sunset, or a hundred years of conservation effort, writing up some stories from the field has been keeping me busy.
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September 3rd is Vulture Awareness Day, and raising awareness of the plight of these critically endangered birds has never been...
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On 29 May, BBC Radio 3’s Sunday evening celebration of all things sonic Between the Ears presents a programme titled The Lark Descending. Presented by Lucy Hodson, it takes the much-loved song of the skylark, and Vaughan Williams’s much-loved orchestral paean to the bird, and places them in their 21st century context. The programme airs a newly commissioned piece by Hinako Omori and includes a contribution from me.
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One day this week I reached a personal milestone, and the following day I reached another. On 31 January, after...
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Edward O. Wilson was an influencer in the true sense - someone whose ideas and ability to communicate them will be valued for decades to come.
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At last, the diary has started filling up with real live events and real live audiences. The variety of gigs I have booked this autumn is greater than ever.
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This week, an obscure institution known as the Aarey Dairy Development Corporation handed over 812 acres of forested land wedged between inner-city Mumbai and the hills of the Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP) to the state forest department. If it was not the end of the battle to save Mumbai’s ‘green lung’, it may at least be the beginning of the end.
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All talks below, unless otherwise stated, are entitled The Long Spring, the story of the project described in my book.
Macclesfield Community Centre, Duke Street, Macclesfield, SK11 6UR
Marple Senior Citizens' Hall, Memorial Park, SK6 6BA
Quaker Meeting House, Thornhill Street, Wakefield, WF1 1NQ
St John Fisher Church Hall, 48 Thanet Rd, Bexley DA5 1AP
Old Court Room, Huddersfield Town Hall, Ramsden Street, Huddersfield, HD1 2TA
