Reading walks in Ruskin Land: the potential for literature to advance nature recovery

The success of nature recovery is determined by the efforts of policymakers, conservation bodies, and landowners, but also the extent to which the wider public is empowered to engage with, value, and actively participate in the restoration of the natural world.

In this paper, we present a vision of how to achieve this, grounded in evidence collected over five years of research and public engagement in Ruskin Land in the Wyre Forest exploring how imaginative literature can enhance people’s understanding of and emotional connection to place. At its heart is the reading walk – a powerful tool for interdisciplinary education, creative research, and inclusive participatory policymaking.

We argue that the reading walk can be implemented at multiple scales: nationally in the school curriculum, regionally though public agencies, and locally through grassroot, community initiatives. We also reflect on potential barriers people may face when implementing this approach in different contexts of nature recovery, and the necessary conditions for successful adoption.

Imaginative literature, we contend, can play a vital role in advancing nature recovery through expanding environmental awareness and encouraging inclusive and meaningful participation in policy development.

Key themes

Literature, forests, reading walk, interdisciplinary education, participatory policymaking, public engagement

Professor John Holmes is Professor of Victorian Literature and Culture at the University of Birmingham and President of the Commission on Science and Literature. He works closely with scientists and scientific institutions confronting climate change and biodiversity loss. He is the lead for arts and humanities within the Birmingham Institute for Forest Research and co-founder of Symbiosis, a network of universities and museums researching and promoting the role of the arts within natural history collections.

Dr Dion Dobrzynski is a teacher and environmental humanities scholar whose work explores the relationship between literature and ecology from the nineteenth century to the present, with a particular interest in interdisciplinary approaches to environmental pedagogy. He is the author of the forthcoming Forest Ecology and Fantasy Fiction: Morris, Tolkien, Le Guin (Bloomsbury, 2026).

Forest Reading List

Reading Walk Guide