Islands: Searching for Truth on the Shoreline by Mark Easton

988 in stock

143mm x 222mm x 36mm

Pages: 370

GǣA spellbinding serial voyage in which encounters with islands across time are gathered, displayed and reburnished. Memoir becomes morality, as the oldest human myths challenge present neglect and political malfunction.Gǥ GÇô Iain Sinclair GǣIlluminating, incisive and beautifully written.Gǥ GÇô Kirsty Young GǣFrom ancient Crete to modern Canvey, this is a fascinating voyage around island identity, exploring isolation and imagination through a wealth of stories from around the world.Gǥ GÇô Martha Kearney GǣA timely and original exploration of the liminalities of islands and the waters that envelop by turns beguiling, enchanting and ultimately affirming.Gǥ GÇô Sir Anthony Seldon GǣThis is a huge theme which Mark Easton pursues with vigorous and beautifully clear prose. His archipelagic fascination is contagious. Read this and the maps in your mind will never be quite the same again.Gǥ GÇô Peter Hennessy *** No man is an island, wrote John Donne. BBC Home Editor Mark Easton argues the that we are all islands, and it is upon the contradictory shoreline where isolation meets connectedness, where GÇÿusGÇÖ meets GÇÿthemGÇÖ, that we find out who we truly are. Suggesting that a continental bias has blinded us, Easton chronicles a sweep of 250 million years of island from Pangaea (the supercontinent mother of all islands) to the first intrepid islanders pointing their canoes over the horizon, from exploration to occupation, exploitation to liberation, a hopeful journey to paradise and a chastening reminder of our planetGÇÖs fragility. But that is only half of this mesmerising aided by the muse he names Pangaea, Easton also interweaves reflections on what he calls GÇÿthe psychological islands that form the great archipelago of humankindGÇÖ. Taking readers on an enchanting adventure, he illustrates how understanding islands and island syndrome might help humanity get closer to the truth about itself. Brave, intelligent and haunting, Islands is a deep dive into geography, myth, literature, politics and philosophy that reveals nothing less than a map of the human heart.