FENCING PARADISE

DREAMS OF THE GOOD LIFE

While 'Lark Rise to Candleford', Flora Thompson's much-loved portrait of life in the English countryside, has inspired a hit television series, relatively little is known about the author herself. Here, Richard Mabey retraces her life and her transformation from a post-office clerk who left school at fourteen to a sophisticated professional writer.

NATURE CURE

When Richard Mabey, Britain's foremost nature writer, fell into a severe depression, the natural world – which since childhood had been a source of joy and inspiration for him – became meaningless. Then, cared for by friends, he left the cosseting woods of the Chiltern hills for the open flatlands of Norfolk and started to write again. He found exhilaration in discovering a whole new landscape and gained fresh insights into our place in nature.