Celebrating the ordinary: Taking a look at the countryside for what it really is

Tracking Back: In the latest in his series of reflections on places and pathways, Will Gore wonders why our visions of rural life are so extreme

Will Gore
Saturday 22 June 2019 11:41 BST
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Golden flax: these types of crops are becoming rarer in England
Golden flax: these types of crops are becoming rarer in England

It’s easy enough to romanticise the English countryside: sparkling lakes and drystone walls; beech hangers and chalk hills; a place for everything and everything in its place.

On the other hand, rural life is frequently presented in its worst light too, as if there is somehow a need to balance the poetic idealism seen in glossy magazines or Escape to the Country. In this negative version, farming is on the rack, drug use and depression is rife, and regressive political views compete only with apathy.

As ever, there are germs of truth in both accounts – but there is also a less dramatic reality in between, evident in places you wouldn’t give a second glance to since they are neither stunningly beautiful nor scenes of rubber-necking ruination.

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