01 Anita Roy on nature writing and making good things happen in transition towns

In a borrowed room at local Tone Dale House, author and activist Anita Roy chats to me about personal and community transformation. We are in Wellington in Somerset, winner of the national prize for best transition town, and we hear how the people did it. They created a new commons, a 65-acre woodland-orchard that all are free to use. Anita talks about the up-down down-up arc of writing and how it mirrors our own lives. She says, “I wonder what this is going to be like in 20 years; everything’s getting worse, except when I think of Fox’s Field.” Anita recommends two books: Wild by Jay Griffiths; and The Spell of the Sensuous by David Abram. Her own books include Gifts of Gravity and Light and her children’s book about death, Gravepyres; The School for the Recently Deceased. She is a writer for The Guardian’s Country Diary. Her recommended action: be messy, leave ecological spaces, and maybe holes are good. My new book will be supporting this podcast, and will be published in March 2027. It’s called "Bamboo and Butterfly: Transformative Stories for Climate and Nature Recovery."