A trip across the British Islands

Patrick Barkham reveals the natural, social and literary history of the Islands that surround the larger Island of Britain, by starting his journey on the Isle of Man, discovering more complex and interesting than the tax-avoiding crooks, his explanation driven by curiosity with a nose for a unique story. He mentions a collection of island-loving literary figures like DH Lawrence and Compton Mackenzie. He asks us to imagine what it is about these islands that makes them such special, inspirational places, “small, perfectly formed and eminently possess-able”. DH Lawrence’s story was based on the life of his friend Mackenzie, a writer remembered even now for “Whisky Galore (1947), who was able to buy homes on a string of islands, then the entire island themselves which he leased Herm and Jethou in the Bailiwick of Guernsey for a few years between the wars.

The British Isles are an archipelago made up of two large islands and 6, 289 smaller ones, like Isle of Man, Eigg,  Bardsey, resting place of 20,000 saints, St Kilda, famed for the evacuation of its human population,now taken over by wild seabirds and sheep, Ray Island in Essex which abandoned and mysterious places haunted by myths, ghosts and foxes. He met all kind of islanders, from nun to puffins, local legends to rare subspecies of vole.

Patrick Barkham’s first book, The Butterfly Isles, set out to view all 59 British species of the insect in a single summer, Islander like its predecessor Coastlines (2015).

Barkham mentions, Shearwaters, Gannets, Guillemots and the corncrake as he walks between gaps in fat hedges of dying elm. He also hears on Barra, where he’s entranced by the “piercing scratch-scritch mechanical-frog craziness and on Rathlin off the coast of Northern Island, the bird is notable for its absence.

Islander: A Journey Around Our Archipelago by Patrick Barkham Granta £20 368 pages.