Episode 1 - The Living Mountain by Nan Shepherd, a book chosen by Helen Thomas

00:00:00: Ok

00:00:04: Yeah ready so that's so this is the first let's a iteration or test of.

00:00:14: A book I love which will hopefully turn into a series and sitting next to me.

00:00:21: Helen Thomas from womenwritingarchitecture.org,

00:00:29: from GTA exhibition who is also ache

00:00:33: Madame ET age which is the Kiosk with Now set up as a bookshop in the exhibition space of Duty exhibitions we joined by Emily atack.

00:00:46: Who is also part of the team of womenwritingarchitecture.org.

00:00:59: We're going to look at a book that Helen and brought with us called The Living mountain by Nan Shepherd which was I believe written in the 1940s.

00:01:10: Published only 30 years later in the 70s which maybe we will get to later on and before we get into that I'm just going to describe shortly where we are so we're in

00:01:22: one of the exhibition spaces of a Gtech submissions we can see the Kiosk with all the books and their annotations which perhaps you can get into a little bit later on

00:01:34: sitting in midst installation of cabin crew which is the product format and.

00:01:42: Yes I think that's that's all for the introduction.

00:01:48: We've got a little table in front of us which with artefacts placed on a which factory can describe after Helen connected to the book for you and somewhere.

00:02:03: Yeah maybe we can start off by if you could talk a little bit more about womenwritingarchitecture.org have this event came about,

00:02:15: when then we heard about Matt myth and her kiosk well and also we were invited by the GTX fishing team in the F2

00:02:25: contribute to ETA shift kiosk B using a selection of books and a little bit stunts because you know women writing really really long list of books which we've been inviting people to

00:02:40: contribute to video the last year so we will go so which books which five points can we possibly choose from this year

00:02:50: list of Towers in books and then we decided that what we would do for Tuesday books that were most valuable to us and by that we mean,

00:02:58: book steps the most people have

00:03:01: that book is important to them I put my Facebook back to invite people to spend in idea for all sorts of text poem even films that as long as you also if a woman or a licence.

00:03:14: So yeah so we ended up to think five books and then we thought really the presence of women writing to be,

00:03:24: not just the books but to make some to make some

00:03:30: ephemeral present so Emily who's here today made some beautiful bookmarks which included information about the books that were chosen with the annotations by by different people.

00:03:44: To China encourage visitors to the bookshop visitors to Madame eth2 to author write their thoughts on the books so in a way this this events today is a little bit too

00:03:59: is it has been started to really encourage more people to feel welcome and,

00:04:06: invited to tell us opening about book so we started off by me telling you my opinion about a book and I hope to sort of being courage in so yeah

00:04:19: I bought a book with me which isn't on my list yet so we're going to happily as it on and as Geraldine said it's The Living mountain by Nan Shepherd.

00:04:31: And actually Alicia is much more knowledgeable than me about the back of hand.

00:04:36: Amazing research that hopefully a little bit more of her voice later but I chose it really just because I loved the writing I love the book and I and I love the Cairngorms say that

00:04:49: the sun Shepherd station because although I've been there I've never actually walked for the 12 to 14 hours that's required to get onto the plat.

00:05:00: Nan Shepherd talks about a lot in the book we've just kind of walked around the foothills of the candle on and looked admiringly at the plateau which is very very beautiful so the snow in Scotland

00:05:13: in the heart of Scotland in the Highlands and they're quite an interesting place.

00:05:19: In that the Queen has her Scottish castle near Balmoral which was actually

00:05:24: built by Queen Victoria in the 19th century and has invert have got a very fancy hotel there that you can if you know you can drop in for a cocktail after you've been for a walk in the Cairngorms

00:05:38: the various large estates and wealthy people and Crofters and huge diversity of people living around the mountain I think,

00:05:48: probably in some way similar to the time that Nan Shepherd talks about at the beginning of the 20th century but also very different.

00:05:56: I'm going to head back now to Geraldine who is Terry and I think he's going to ask some questions.

00:06:09: Who discovered how did they discover it I don't know and I was too recommendation by the body I came across it somehow.

00:06:18: But but I love it because I love the writing and and it's a book that I don't know maybe we could,

00:06:28: you guys but there is some books that I give as gifts to my friends because they're very very meaningful to me and the foot the first this is in the

00:06:36: book of that type the first book of that type that I have is leonora Carrington

00:06:41: the lifting trumpet because I really love the way she celebrates old ladies and she makes utopia well dystopia for them but it's just so fascinating during said it was actually made by herself,

00:06:56: so that's something that I started to give two friends so I thought maybe they could join me in an old lady dystopia in the future but I think some of them

00:07:05: the mutant I didn't really know why different to them and then this book about,

00:07:12: about mountains I don't know that's more recent my kind of obsession with it but maybe it

00:07:19: to do with becoming more connected to Switzerland and then all ends in a thinking about,

00:07:24: the mountainous land of Switzerland and how different it is to Scotland,

00:07:30: and have simpler than also has similar it is a maybe that's also something that will touch upon together later so yeah the reason I loved it is because it's a book that I feel that I can share.

00:07:41: With friends so we can I don't know it's very emotional the book and.

00:07:47: Physical and something that you kinda it's a bit like a friendship that you that you say.

00:07:55: I think what would be really nice if we could hear a short passage of the book just so we can hear the language and then we can.

00:08:03: Going to the themes for couple of things,

00:08:07: that's good I think I was going to start with the very end with chapter 12 which is called being and the titles of the staff a beautiful,

00:08:21: she starts off I'm just flicking to it now she starts with a chapter one is called the plateau which of course is the main feature of the Cairngorms and the 1st,

00:08:35: 6 Chapter 4 really describing the mountains and the atmosphere around them so this the plateau the recesses the,

00:08:44: and then water Frost and snow and light and then after that,

00:08:50: Nan Shepherd starts to talk about living things but to me really hurting is most successful when she's actually describing the mountains this living talks about plants birds and it becomes much more specific and less.

00:09:05: More difficult to reconnect to an individual but but but when she gets to the last three chapters of sleep the fences and being it again moved out being begins.

00:09:20: Here then maybe lived a life of the fences so pure so untouched by any motive apprehension but their own that the body may be fed to think.

00:09:30: Each sense heighten to its most explicit awareness is it in itself total experience,

00:09:36: this is the Innocence we have lost living in one sense of tie at a time to live all the way through.

00:09:44: So there I lie on the plateau.

00:09:47: Under me the central court of Fire from which was thrust this crumbling grinding mass of plutonic rock over me blueair.

00:09:56: And between the fire of the Rock and the fire of the sun.

00:09:59: Scree soil and water Moss grass flower and tree insects birds and beast wind rain and snow the total amount.

00:10:11: Slowly I have found my way in if I had other senses there are other things I should know.

00:10:18: It is nonsense to suppose when I have received the exquisite division of running water or a flower that my separate centres can make that there would be nothing more to receive when we in button down with other modes of perception.

00:10:33: How could we imagine flavour or perfume without the senses of taste and smell they are completely.

00:10:42: There must be many exciting properties of matter that we cannot know because we have no way to know them yet.

00:10:50: With what we know what will this what we have what wealth I had it I had 2 each time I go to the mountains,

00:11:00: the ic40 didn't feed before or season in New way what it is already seen so the ear the other senses,

00:11:08: it is an experience that grows and distinguish days at their part and now and then unpredictable and Unforgettable can the Alice when heaven and earth fall away and when season.

00:11:21: The many details a stroke here a stroke.

00:11:25: Come for a moment into perfect Focus and one can read that last the words that have been from the beginning

00:11:33: what she saved at the beginning of chapter 12 I think it is absolutely in capsulated and here I turned to the table at Geraldine earlier in the quote that is on the 5-pound Note Scottish five

00:11:45: and her faith is featured on

00:11:51: £5 note the only female faith in any British currency and the quotev it's a grand thing to get leave to live,

00:12:01: and I think that's just such an amazing method that of gratefulness that we are alive and if amazing world and

00:12:08: I know and I really like her message I think we have five senses through which we can perceive the world and really enjoy it and and we can perceive it over and over again and each time enjoy it in a different way,

00:12:19: so I just found that fantastic a fantastic thing to share with friends as well that's also maybe.

00:12:28: An interesting connection to or the beginning of the book which is quite dark actually the big it right that I think it's maybe even the full word where she speaks a lot about death and which is kind of

00:12:40: she she describes who also dies on the mountain or the danger of the mountain and perhaps,

00:12:47: in this in the beginning of the book it's very much so the mountain is quite frightening and then when we get into the book and these vary.

00:12:57: The quite methodical chapters at the descriptions and the way she can quite almost scientifically that say it's a very poetically poetic scientifically.

00:13:10: Write about that describes this mountain it gets.

00:13:15: Turn from looking at the mountains and being being frightened of the mountain to actually being in midst all this nature and really can on the mountain match.

00:13:26: Don't know if you'd like to I can add some separate knowledge to Dad so I was doing my research on Nan,

00:13:37: was actually called Anna which I was quite surprised because.

00:13:41: It's a little silly name my thing to call once I was none as an awful no so I I did it did some reach research on her and there's not that many information about her and her life.

00:13:55: There was a little time after she had like a riding flow where she stopped writing and publishing,

00:14:03: and people that were close to her she had like this little lover which also.

00:14:13: Said some things about her she was falling into a great depression I think and this is for me when she talks about the senses it's the sense of living that you can only have describe so beautifully if you also.

00:14:28: A knowledge like the other side the side of death and for me as I am a painter so.

00:14:37: That's why I really connected to the book because there's also no white without the black colour and it's like all this contrasts in a book which is really describe,

00:14:49: with a lot of like beautiful nests or like.

00:14:53: A lot of the word she is using always quite beautiful but as I said you experienced this Darkness at the same time while reading those beautiful words she's also challenging.

00:15:08: Our own senses while reading the book like the sense of the language that uses and the sense of being or trying to live.

00:15:18: This mountain well not being there and like all this contrasts are in the book how she plays with them are quite interesting.

00:15:29: Yeah I mean what I think what really struck me.

00:15:33: The most was this I mean I haven't read that many books about mountains all all nature but really kind.

00:15:44: How inter how much details you really goes and I mean.

00:15:52: There was a couple of there was a couple of moments reading it when I when I thought this could be.

00:16:01: Taxing almost because it's kind of really just.

00:16:04: It goes through the plant that that the plants and it goes through the water then it goes through the birds but it never does because as you say it's very.

00:16:16: It's it's also very emotional or very connected to.

00:16:22: To this nature and you can very much picture what she's describing mean for me.

00:16:31: And it's funny what you said at the beginning that for you when it became.

00:16:36: When she started connecting to living things such as birds and animals.

00:16:42: That you can have disconnected a little bit more and for me that was actually the point when I connected quite a lot yeah so the birds was.

00:16:50: The main thing because I'm I'm also fascinated by birds actually since since the pandemic would have had quite a lot as well and I think also had to do with the fact,

00:17:01: there were more birds where I was living because there were less planes but also.

00:17:07: My Passat I just had more space to actually perceive these birds and I became really fascinated by them and that's why the whole class especially as a pathogen on the crested

00:17:20: which was crouching behind the tree.

00:17:26: Waiting for these tits 22cans.

00:17:33: See Hannah and that being really still yeah and then flew flying way soon as soon as she she moved.

00:17:40: Subaru striking is that you said in the searches and the,

00:17:54: give us some tips of like how to experience the pain is like it's not.

00:18:00: Trying absolutely to reach the Summits it like being inside no and acting like a dog doing round and trying to find the corners and and.

00:18:13: You have a sweet sick from you really content friend with like looking at nature and,

00:18:22: it's kind of disgaea experience I like being part of this really like,

00:18:28: fastest living layers on top of the planets and above it so not trying to dominate like this video.

00:18:39: Iconic representation of the above everything in.

00:18:44: So I was really trying that she was writing that video early and running like a man would have,

00:18:56: routed differently at bedtime and who was also.

00:19:02: I guess that I m so popular to go hiking in the mountains.

00:19:12: Like the British.

00:19:24: Results of the timer beginning of environmentalism.

00:19:29: I'm not an expert but like the Sierra club in the status almost exactly contemporary it was also that opening people's eyes too.

00:19:40: In a magnificent of the landscape and also the fragility like all the systems have it and.

00:19:47: I mean like anthem Ansel Adams I don't need didn't just photograph things from the top of mountains that he did he did try to evoke.

00:19:57: The embracing environments that prince your sanity and those incredible sites which were became symbols for conservation movement.

00:20:12: I mean I think that's also quite extraordinary that she manages to do that in her writing at the nature really becomes the protagonist because.

00:20:21: She's writing but still the narrator is in the background and.

00:20:27: Write in such a way that the native from Skegness is quite extraordinary and not that easy I imagine as well that.

00:20:36: The perspective really shifts I mean when you say that it's immediately came come into comes in time and Jack London you know he's in he's a,

00:20:45: he's a male voice 270 writing decubitus that night for the East completely different it's also the themes of,

00:20:53: respect for definite that you mention Emily of building a present it's still very much a man the imagination imagining what it's like to be a dog sitter.

00:21:07: The one about the dog.

00:21:10: Anyway it's fantastic that begins with Wolves in the forest and it's so powerful but,

00:21:20: anyway,

00:21:21: I'm lucky it up will tell you later but I think I think it's really interesting and I've often wondered about that you know this is it a female version

00:21:32: because I mean also I think for me it's a metaphor for little how to lead your life as well which is enough,

00:21:38: you know you don't have to reach for the Thanet but there's great depth in encircling,

00:21:43: looking the recesses whitefang I think he won't phone but it's too cold,

00:21:51: yeah but it's not the same he's not he's not describe me in such a scientific way that's the thing that points really interesting but what you were saying also and what both of you

00:22:03: made me think about the kinds of knowledge but she's the way she gathering and then describing knowledge and I think,

00:22:12: I don't know maybe it's German but the idea of being fine terrific you know because you know the British,

00:22:19: well known for being empirical and it's an incredibly empirical book it's about Gathering knowledge through observation and living the Living experience and and I guess maybe you know.

00:22:32: The empirical DP poetic in the first half of the book to me but then when it starts to

00:22:37: even though she talks about specific incidence it starts to become more,

00:22:44: about naming in a bit more katigbak applications and more sign.

00:22:49: And I don't know I mean we're both British I'm not being scientific moment of Change.

00:23:05: Small comments about reaching the summit it's like when she describe.

00:23:12: When you go hiking in group and it's what I heading to maybe my experience you really quickly see the personality of each person of the group said they are the ones that rents really quickly and then after 10th

00:23:27: exhausted small completed group of 5 you can really see who is doing what.

00:23:34: I'm in this may be able to go to a little bit more into the specifics also of kind of it connects to what you're saying because if I think about.

00:23:43: The Swiss mountains and who is on the Swiss mountains for me and it is very stereotypical I know and of course there's differences but for me the Swiss mountain is are very much.

00:23:56: Get to your goal very kitted out very goal-oriented and as fast as you can and then your the summon is kind.

00:24:05: The thing and.

00:24:09: We were talking yesterday and a little more kind of we met to prepare a little bit for today about how different the experience of the man's.

00:24:18: Can be and you were talking about your experience in Turkey you had recently Pepsi could talk a little bit about that again that was real.

00:24:28: I just want to pick up on the subject before about the cost for me this was.

00:24:36: Quite important in this book for me it's not only the difference about maybe how a man would have written this book or a woman but.

00:24:45: This kind of childish or like child to experience her from meteorite as if she.

00:24:53: Still wear a child in the mountains because when you're a child to look at everything and everything can be fascinating if it's a minute or if it's like for an hour.

00:25:04: Your you make the decision as a charger self how long your fascinated by something and it's this moment where she describes where she.

00:25:13: She goes down,

00:25:14: with her head and looks through the legs and who does that as an adult but you are remember as a child you used to do that infamous was funny because I think it was 3 years ago where exactly painted,

00:25:29: a woman in this position so it picked up in the book and I was real.

00:25:35: Independent it was about like being an adult and in the adult world and her everything must be straight,

00:25:42: narrow and the Special like in Switzerland or like as he said like hiking in Switzerland how it can be different especially like now I can connect to hiking in Turkey.

00:25:54: Nobody like hiking is not really a thing people are quite lazy or lazy in the sporty sense I guess.

00:26:04: Turkish people don't really enjoy sports day to enjoy nature and there like white egg dislike there on the Boats and stuff especially they like.

00:26:14: Underwater but then they're not really like hiker so when they go hiking or decide to go actually there,

00:26:23: hi for a little bit but then they like sitting somewhere and then enjoying and like drinking and eating something not going up the hill nobody is really interested about that.

00:26:36: They're only interested if if they maybe someone is taking them up like a taxi or something and then they can look down on the sea so that.

00:26:46: That's what I think is a big difference as you mentioned.

00:26:54: Let me know for sure Swiss hikers are all kitted out but people in Scotland now.

00:27:04: But I think I mean I'm not I don't know totally but the land in the Cairngorms a lot of it.

00:27:11: Part of our lord of the depart of enormous Estates.

00:27:16: In those days and today's Scotland is owned by a tiny number of people who own a huge amount of land.

00:27:23: Nan the lesson Scotland as well established special legal,

00:27:28: the devolved government right to roam so a large percentage of the land is available to walk on like in Switzerland just different.

00:27:38: I was going to bring England.

00:27:40: Comedians in so the people who maintains and even form the land in Scotland were usually people who worked for the lads who work for the.

00:27:53: In Switzerland where always strikes me is high.

00:27:58: You know you could say that the origins of cooperatives and of socialism is in the high Valleys in the mountains,

00:28:06: small villages had to work together in order to look after the animals in order to grow the special potatoes etc etc and you have,

00:28:15: different types of land around the villages in the village about the village at which are still owned and governed in that way.

00:28:24: Set a very different politics to the land and the people and many more people are involved with looking after the land in Switzerland because there's a CD system which means that far.

00:28:38: Can more than just survive they can do rather well-being farmers because.

00:28:44: For a couple of reasons I think because the mountains are so much part of the national identity in Switzerland but also because.

00:28:52: People acknowledge that it's the Farmers who make the Landscape The Tourists and whether their Swiss tourist or foreign tourists enjoy and that requires a huge amount of,

00:29:05: has a dozen Scotland died in Scotland a lot of the maintenance now is.

00:29:10: Rich people go shooting Grouse which is you know nothing I'm playing for people are discussing their Grouse shooting weekend coming up.

00:29:18: It's hard to keep your food down you know it's you can't believe what you're hearing.

00:29:25: So just the Gore-Tex and everything yes but actually I see that kind of social project in the mountains in Switzerland which is very different.

00:29:37: Where in in Scotland if it's really part of the whole.

00:29:42: Establishment yeah I mean I actually worked on and out once a whole summer and it was a very small and I think probably that type of alkyl amine that can be sustained as you say because of.

00:29:57: The police because of subsidies and politics Jesus there's no I mean they make maybe I don't know what hundred cheese is a year or something is nothing so it's all subsidised exactly under,

00:30:09: I volunteered so it's also.

00:30:13: Works with volunteers and yeah and I guess a lot of it is also military still who work on parts and and so so on yeah.

00:30:24: We wanted to get a little bit into how the book is also connected to architecte would you would you like to.

00:30:33: I mean it's a really difficult question because I mean and I think it's 30 note it's actually connect to our mission in women writing architecture,

00:30:42: in which all three of the terms womenwritingarchitecture.org

00:30:52: it's definitely a concept which is being stretched now I'm in a very interesting way.

00:31:00: Writing to

00:31:03: place it where we're staying at you know let's explore what writing is and then so architecture I think but just by bringing the female imagination to the to the subject starts

00:31:14: stretched out what it can be and I think we've already touched quite a few points for now that

00:31:19: expanded way connect to what I had the way we can define architecture and I guess maybe one of the easiest way even if something that I mentioned earlier,

00:31:31: about my house off at the Sierra club which is about sodium

00:31:35: so this notion that we are not we don't own things but we are custodians for the future so we have a responsibility to care for something and to make sure that he can

00:31:49: perpetual it can persist

00:31:51: be perpetual mean but not anything but you know I mean it's really massive question with climate change do you know we are responsible for our world now and I'll world in the future so I think.

00:32:06: Well that's not you no explicit necessarily in her book the care she takes to live and well in this place and she just talk about how it will hurt changes that that's an issue that,

00:32:20: is architectural simple level that the idea of,

00:32:30: how how you understand the place of architectural site of someone that can be measured in terms of,

00:32:41: monetary value or,

00:32:44: amenity value for humans actually place has much more subtle quality that's bad that's value,

00:32:55: so kind of see questions and ocean of Value I think I'll bring that question into imaginations know what is valuable and nothing that sent,

00:33:04: architecture always responds tonight.

00:33:07: Listen very very interesting questions that mean in the school of Architecture about what what is valuable and what is beautiful that being asked now and I think that she really frame from the think about that was a very help.

00:33:23: I mean I guess what you are saying before Emily which is kind of as the bookies.

00:33:32: Couldn't let's a non anthropocentric so the human is not in the centre of this book it is also.

00:33:40: None architectural in the sense because architecture is also evolved humans.

00:33:49: Let's a conventional idea.

00:33:55: Yeah we think about such as being in cities that we all used to.

00:34:02: Cohabitation you know it's Dad cities are actually very successful habitats for a lot of animals much more southern and wild animals are attracted to cities because of the abundance of food.

00:34:16: Shelter etc maybe also the absence of competitors but compared to a lot of books on.

00:34:27: To me the way to this book is so explicitly environmental and spatial and descriptive you know it's there other books that I think I'm much more to,

00:34:41: locate within a frame of Architecture or spatial practise in the relationship is deciding spatial practice because in this book it's absolutely.

00:34:51: Explicit and what you were saying also it's that decentering humans so that also seems very very relevant now.

00:34:58: But if you just you know if you looked at what the students in the school are doing.

00:35:02: You know many of the studios half I would say I really questioning what architecture is because we're in the moment.

00:35:10: Transition Christ the solid these things.

00:35:13: That's not a hard cell I think in terms of this book being very within a kind of discourse of architecture.

00:35:23: I mean she was so acknowledges actually the importance of one of the chapters having is towards the end she talks about the gamekeepers.

00:35:32: And their importance also of regulating certain.

00:35:36: So I think it's dear and and stags and who would otherwise take over and,

00:35:43: down this will spread and so forth so there is it is not also completely it does couples come in yet we're already,

00:35:51: 40 minutes already but I don't know if someone would like to say something or as a question.

00:36:00: I just wanted to say that I was really glad to have read this book and I surely will read it again and again I think it's a book.

00:36:09: Which you can read over and over and pick up.

00:36:13: Some little details so yeah I thank you very much for bringing the book and it's now also in the Madame ETA.

00:36:24: Special special price gun get the book by Nan Shepherd mm.