Description
Wyl Menmuir’s The Draw of the Sea is a book about the fishermen, surfers, swimmers, beachcombers, conservationists, sailors and boatbuilders who make their living on the Cornish Coast. Since the earliest stages of human development,
the sea has fascinated and entranced us. It feeds us,
sustaining communities and providing livelihoods, but it also holds
immense destructive power which can take all those away in an instant.
It connects us to far away places, offering the
promise of new lands and voyages of discovery, but also
shapes our borders, carving divisions between landmasses and
eroding the very ground beneath our feet. In this
beautifully-written meditation on what it is that draws us to the waters' edge, author Wyl Menmuir tells the stories of the
people whose lives revolve around the sea in the Cornish community where he lives.
In twelve interlinked chapters, Menmuir explores the lives of
local fishermen steeped in the rich traditions of a fishing community, the beachcombers who wander the shores in search of the varied objects which wash ashore and the stories they tell, and all number of others who have made their lives on the
beautiful Cornwall coast. He also writes movingly about
his own connection to the sea, telling
heartfelt personal anecdotes about what it has come to mean in his and his family's lives.
This book is a meaningful and moving work into
how we interact with the environment around us, and how it comes to
shape the course of our lives. As unmissable as it is compelling, as profound as it is personal, this
must-read book will delight anyone familiar with the intimate and powerful pull which the sea holds over us.
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