Nan Shepherd tells of exploring the Cairngorm Mountains of Scotland with a companion. The women stopped to bathe in Cairn Gorm. They waded out, Shepherd leading.
Then I looked down; and at my feet there opened a gulf of brightness so profound that the mind stopped. We were standing on the edge of a shelf that ran some yards into the loch before plunging down to the pit that is the true bottom.
It’s a breathtaking scene, but I like this part best:
I motioned to my companion, who was a step behind, and she came, and glanced as I had down the submerged precipice. Then we looked into each other’s eyes, and again into the pit. I waded slowly back into shallower water. There was nothing that seemed worth saying.
Shepherd writes beautifully about a topic that’s seldom touched: how the silence of a natural place can be enhanced by the right kind of companion on the trail. It’s tricky because what can be enhanced can be ruined.
This scene is in Shepherd’s The Living Mountain, written in the 1940s.
Shepherd is well known but is a new find for me. The recommendation came from Judith Anderson of Scotland. Thank you, Judith.
• Sources: Nan Shepherd, The Living Mountain; Edinburgh: Canongate, 2011.
Robert Macfarlane wrote a lovely introduction to Shepherd: “I walk therefore I am”; The Guardian, Aug. 29, 2008. It can be found here:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2008/aug/30/scienceandnature.travel
No comments:
Post a Comment