Is a River Alive?

Resumen del libro

From celebrated writer Robert Macfarlane comes this brilliant, perspective-shifting new book which answers a resounding yes to the question of its title. At its heart is a single, transformative idea: that rivers are not mere matter for human use, but living beings who should be recognized as such in both imagination and law. Is a River Alive? takes the reader on an exhilarating exploration of the past, present and futures of this ancient, urgent concept.

The book flows first to northern Ecuador, where a miraculous cloud-forest and its rivers are threatened by goldmining. Then, to the wounded rivers, creeks and lagoons of southern India, where a desperate battle to save the lives of these waterbodies is under way. And finally, to north-eastern Quebec, where a spectacular wild river the Mutehekau or Magpie is being defended from death by damming in a river-rights campaign.

At once Macfarlane's most personal and most political book to date, Is a River Alive? will open hearts, spark debates and lead us to the revelation that our fate flows with that of rivers and always has.

Biografía del autor

Robert Macfarlane (Halam, 1976) Estudió en Oxford y Cambridge, de donde es profesor en el Emmanuel College. Se le considera uno de los autores centrales de la nature writing, con grandes éxitos de ventas como Las montañas de la mente, una historia cultural de las cimas, ganadora del The Guardian Book Prize 2003, o bien Naturaleza virgen, sus crónicas de expediciones en las que se adentra en zonas remotas de Gran Bretaña e Irlanda. Sus trabajos se han traducido a gran cantidad de lenguas, y se han hecho numerosas adaptaciones al cine o la televisión que le han merecido los principales galardones del género, como el Premio E. M. Forster de la Academia Americana de las Artes y las Letras.