Heeding Nature

A relaxed afternoon walking in the woods of Dulverton with three creatives who pay close heed to the environment and weave thoughtful and sensitive observations within their work to share with others.

Catherine Hyde trained in Fine Art Painting at Central School of Art in London and is renowned for her atmospheric and symbolic work. Seven Fables has worked closely with Catherine for many years, and it has been an absolute delight for us, and our customers to watch her work evolve and to see her creative wings unfurl to include the written word. 

‘My deep love for the cycles of the seasons inspires all my paintings and The Bee & the Sun is a celebration of the profound importance of the bee as a pollinator in our world.’

‘She is, if you will, a visual poet weaving images, symbols and archetypes into paintings that resonate in the subconscious and linger there like half-remembered dreams or the dark fairy stories with which she has such affiliation’.

Pip Palmer, Galleries Magazine

Rob Cowen's debut, Skimming Stones and Other Ways of Being in the Wild won the 2012 Society of Authors' Roger Deakin Award. Common Ground, his second book is recognised as a seminal and genre-defying work redefining writing on people and place. His most recent publication The Heeding, marked his debut as a poet and became a bestselling book of poetry in 2021.

Rob has contributed to the Independent, New York Times, Guardian and Telegraph and has written essays and radio programmes for the BBC. His work has featured in various global journals and books.

Common Ground - 'This is writing of the highest order…he exists one step removed from the current nature writing world. Cowen writes as if from the subconscious, evoking those feelings many of us might experience but for which words and language so often feel just beyond reach. He’s an outlier, a Northern voice, a set of eyes on the soil, and Common Ground is his outstanding addition to – and expansion of – the canon.'

Benjamin Myers - The Gallows Pole, The Perfect Golden Circle

‘The Heeding isn’t a book. It’s a gateway into the place all of us have been looking for.’ Joanne Harris

Jane Lovell is an award-winning poet whose work focuses on our relationship with the planet and its wildlife. She recently won the 2022 RIALTO Nature & Place Competition with her poem Blame the Fox. 2020 saw her winning The Ginkgo Prize and 2018 The Wigtown Poetry Prize. Jane also writes for Dark Mountain and Photographers Against Wildlife Crime.

Her 'poems are a series of hauntings. Sensory, porous, poignant in its truest sense, their painful, sudden beauty and physicality becomes embodied organically as Seamus Heaney said, they come at you sideways, “and catch the heart off guard, and blow it open.” This is just what poetry should do. Lovell is a great poet, her lines capture all it means to be human, present and in touch with the wild.'

Miriam Darlington - Owl Sense, Otter Country

There will be a book signing opportunity either in the woods or when we return to Seven Fables, and you may purchase titles by all three speakers on the day or in advance - do contact us. Ticket price includes a £5.00 voucher which may be redeemed against titles by Catherine Hyde, Rob Cowen and Jane Lovell.

A level of walking fitness is required, please wear suitable footwear and dress appropriately as we will still venture out if it is raining. ​Bring a drink and a snack to enjoy, and most importantly something to keep your bottom dry as we will find a mossy cushion or log to sit on!

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*Sorry no dogs as we do not wish to disturb the creative conversation

If you have any questions, please do ask - info@sevenfables.co.uk or call 01398 324457