#The way of the shepherd free

HeВ shows wit, likening the shearing ofВ ewesвЂ™ tailsВ so that rams can mount them more easily to вЂњremoving woolly knickersвЂќ. Again and again, without losing his focus, Rebanks reveals the wider context. ToВ these he adds styleВ and character вЂњbecause sheep are cultural objects, almost like artвЂќ. He does say that once he had become a student, people вЂњwanted to talk about current affairs when I met them on the laneвЂќ.ДЄfter detailing his jobs вЂ“ laying hedges, hanging gates, bathing sheepsвЂ™ feet and trimming muck from their tails, cleaning roof gutters, and so on вЂ“ he concludes: вЂњLandscapes like ours are the sum total and culmination of aВ million little unseen jobs.вЂќ Among theВ survival characteristics that an inspector of Herdwick tups (rams) looks for when he drives from farm toВ farm around the Lake District are alertness, mobility and strong legs. What is striking is that it makes so little showing in the book вЂ“ presumably, in part, because farming isВ much easier to describe than studying. No doubt, with his intelligence and capacity for hard work, he gives the secondary job his all. Such work is a necessity for Rebanks because hill farming no longer pays him enough to live on. First he had to teach himself cursive writing from childrenвЂ™sВ manuals.ДЄlso remarkable is that he has aВ second job advising the Unesco WorldВ Centre in Paris on how toВ help communities to benefit from tourism. Aged 21, he enrolled at the nearest adult learning centre, with no GCSEs, and found study so easy that a tutor advised him to goВ to university. HeВ wrote a history essay for his elder sister, typing with one finger on a word processor вЂ“ and it was highly praised by her teacher. When he was younger, he excelled in pub quizzes and had become a book-lover after chancing onВ WH HudsonвЂ™s AВ ShepherdвЂ™s Life.

Or have them slaughtered: a graphic section describes a visit to the knackerвЂ™s yard, which was deep in piles of bloated cows and sheep, вЂњpuddles of drying blood and bile, pools of piss вЂ¦ like some vast panorama of animal death by Damien HirstвЂќ.ДЄ surprising strand in the book вЂ“ surprising if youвЂ™re inclined to stereotype вЂњworking menвЂќ or вЂњsheep farmersвЂќ вЂ“ emerges when the writer goes to study at Oxford.

#The way of the shepherd free

Bea grabs a lamb toe in each fist and pulls вЂ¦ The lamb slowly peels outВ of the pink cervix.вЂќ Bea вЂњlaughs because the ewe licks her bloody hands as she sets the lamb downвЂќ and it вЂњwriggles and shakes itself free of the afterbirth slimeвЂќ.ДЄ few pages later, Rebanks generalises about blood in our lives вЂ“ the necessity of it, the reality of it вЂ“ and heВ can do this because he has shown usВ exactly what it takes to look after animals, to feed, shear, medicate and slaughter them. A ewe in the lambing fields is вЂњlying against a wall вЂ¦ paining on its sideвЂќ. One unforgettable farm-work sequence tells of how his middle daughter, Bea, badly wants to deliver a lamb because her elder sister is boasting about the delivery she had managed two days before. And the work is intertwined closely with the characters and relationships of the farming families. It is the work that dominates: gathering and herding, clipping, dosing with antibiotics, feeding, castrating, burning carcasses after the culling decreed during the foot-and-mouth epidemic. They fleet away like the shadows of clouds blown across the lower slopes of the mountains.вЂќ Such glimpses are recurrent, as the writer lifts his eyes from his tough and engrossing work and delights in the world he inhabits.

The section ends like this: вЂњThe men drive the sheep away home. When he and his neighbours are вЂњcleaning outвЂќ some craggy terrain вЂ“ gathering ewes and yearling lambs off the fells to be sheared and separating them into their ownersвЂ™ herds вЂ“ they have to chase the sheep down a narrow alley into the different pens: вЂњif youвЂ™re lucky, you get three seconds to identify the sheepвЂ™s flock mark and open the gate the right way.вЂќ So far, so practical. All this is told with perfect pitch, in prose that flows as easily as speech, cleaves hungrily to the particular, and shifts without strain between the workaday and the imaginative. He brings his grandfatherвЂ™s beloved sheepdog Ben to the bedside, after the older man has had a stroke. He bids for animals at auction, exchanging little signs of encouragement or dissuasion with his father in the spectatorsвЂ™ seats. He falls over in the mud and snow as he looks after sheep struggling through a gruelling winter. The author is always in the midst of the physical.