First, the letters of each lost word are sprinkled randomly among other letters and an impressionistic sketch in a visual puzzle.

Each lost word is afforded three double-page spreads. The Lost Words by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris review sumptuous A book combining meticulous wordcraft with exquisite illustrations deftly restores language describing the natural world. For the word starling, the named bird, painted in detail, perches on a branch against a gold background, while the acrostic begins: “Should green-as-moss be mixed with/ blue-of-steel be mixed with gleam-of-gold/ you’d still fall short by far of the – / Tar-bright oil-slick sheen and/ gloss of starling wing.” The duo captures mystery and magic throughout, offering up “spells of many kinds that might just, by the old, strong magic of being spoken aloud. In his introduction, Macfarlane laments this loss, announcing his intention to create a spellbook for conjuring back these lost words. Nature and travel writer Macfarlane offers “a spellbook for conjuring back these lost words” and transforms each inclusion into a marvelous lyrical acrostic Morris’s paintings of wildlife echo the complexity and vibrancy of Macfarlane’s poetry. The Lost Words by Robert Macfarlane - an Activity Pack The Lost Words The Lost Words stands against the disappearance of wild childhood. A deeply reflective and gorgeously illustrated oversize volume lists natural words that were excluded from the most recent edition of the Oxford Junior Dictionary, among them dandelion, heron, willow, and wren (replacement words in that text include broadband and blog). Keeper of the lost words and defender of the trees Robert Macfarlane has released a poster of his poem Heartwood into the wild in the hopes that people will use it to support land preservation.

The lost words by robert macfarlane