To live, deliberately

Burn by Ben Short

Jun 25, 2023

I found Burn, Ben Short’s memoir of fire, woods and healing, to be near-perfect reading.

On the edge of the field stood an old hedge bank knotted with the root-work of vast beech trees. Behind them, the sun was in a slow red dive west. It would soon be dark. I shuffled over to one of the trees and placing my hand on a low bough, tried to feel some sign I was still me.
— Ben Short

Over the course of just two hundred and forty-four pages of vivid prose, Short describes the mechanics of woodland management and charcoal burning, peels back the painful layers of his struggle with poor mental health, and honours the history of his craft and the mythology of the woods. Honest throughout, not once does he shirk the rough living conditions or the negative assumptions that his nonconformist, semi-nomadic life attracted. My only complaint was that his book ended too soon.

A former advertising man who didn’t so much escape as flee from city life, Short writes very well, his delightfully original similes coined to glorious effect. The character sketches of those he met and worked with on his circuitous and often difficult transition from demanding, trendy London to the peace of a Dorset woodland are riveting, and his encounters with creatures both wild and domestic, and particularly his beloved, feisty and frequently narrative-driving rescue dog, Pig (a.k.a. Clanger), spark from the page.

Studded with facts and folklore, and — above all — love for the forest, this was a book I read with my heart rather than my head; an objective response took time to frame. I knew I would be fascinated, but I was almost surprised at how deeply Short’s journey touched me. I felt the contrary elation of his refusal to be pigeonholed in ‘tick-box Britain,’ the scouring pain of his disappointments and set-backs, the green quickening of his hopes and fulfilment, and the ‘symphony of vibrations echoing back without end’ whenever he entered the woods.

Across the glade three kilns smoke idly. I walk over and stand close to one, bathing in its glow, its ambient heat. From inside there is a sound of popping. It is the wood slowly baking, the hazel turning to coal. I feel at peace. I want to stay.
— Ben Short

When it came time to close the book, time for me to leave Short and his family there in the woods, I wanted to stay, too.