The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees, Robert Penn
The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees, Robert Penn
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The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees

Author: Robert Penn

Narrator: Robert Penn

Unabridged: 7 hr 58 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 07/26/2016


Synopsis

Out of all the trees in the world, the ash is the most closely bound up with who we are. From tool handles to arrows, wheels and bowls to furniture and baseball bats, humans have made more and varied use of ash than any other kind of wood. Journeying across the English-speaking world, Robert Penn meets craftsmen with rare skills and a knowledge of the properties of ash developed over millennia. He finds that ancient traditions still thrive, and he reveals how the people working with this wood every day have a particular and intimate understanding of the physical world. Yet, Penn argues, the world's remaining ash forests also face urgent perils that threaten this unique repository of human history. Brimming with surprising research and vivid nature writing, The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees describes our ages-long relationship with forests and revels in the pleasure of making things by hand.

About Robert Penn

Robert Penn is a journalist who writes for the Financial Times the Observer, the Sunday Times, and Conde Nast Traveller, as well as numerous cycling publications. He also wrote and presented the BBC documentary Ride of My Life: The Story of the Bicycle. Robert lives in the Black Mountains, South Wales, with his wife and three children.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Jim

Penn's love for trees, ash trees in particular, is wonderful to read about. This book is a series of adventures as he traces the uses of common English ash, Fraxinus ecelsior throughout history & much of the western world. It is similar enough to American white ash, Fraxinus_americana that it is als......more

Goodreads review by Filjan

Well I read this in three days which says something good about it. Learnt a lot about the properties of ash wood. It could be a so much better book. It needs proper illustrations, both line drawings and colour photographs. It needs an index. In places it is boringly technical yet the tone is generall......more