One Green Field

Edward Thomas (1878-1917) was an English poet, journalist and essayist. He made his living writing prose for many years, until he was encouraged to compose verse by the American poet Robert Frost. This led to a prolific outburst of extraordinary poetry, which was brought to a tragic end when Thomas was killed in the First World War.

These poetic and highly personal pieces describe Edward Thomas's wanderings through the English countryside, taking in meadows, farms, inns, maypoles, churches and wildlife. Whether exploring the Kent weald or the heart of England, describing a crisp winter morning or a heady August day, evoking the scent of honeysuckle or the primeval atmosphere of an ancient wood, Thomas brings the countryside alive through precise observation and vivid, lyrical prose. 
 
 
Generations of inhabitants have helped shape the English countryside - but it has profoundly shaped us too.It has provoked a huge variety of responses from artists, writers, musicians and people who live and work on the land - as well as those who are travelling through it. English Journeys celebrates this long tradition with a series of twenty books on all aspects of the countryside, from stargazey pie and country churches, to man's relationship with nature and songs celebrating the patterns of the countryside (as well as ghosts and love-struck soldiers).

Edward Thomas

'I have come to the borders of sleep, 
The unfathomable deep 
Forest where all must lose 
Their way, however straight, 
Or winding, soon or late; 
They cannot choose.' 
 
Fired by his abiding love of the English landscape, the poetry of Edward Thomas is some of the most astonishing of the twentieth century. A journalist, essayist and critic for many years, he was encouraged to write verse by his friend Robert Frost. He produced a late outburst of poetry of extraordinary beauty and mystery about the subjects closest to his heart: rural England and its inhabitants, landscape, atmosphere, transience, endurance and death. By 1917, when he was killed on the Western Front, he had earned his place as one of England's most valued poets. This selection brings together his finest verse with his most vivid prose writings on the countryside.

Edward Thomas

Praise for Selected Poems and Prose

The father of us all

Books by Edward Thomas

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