Wilderness thoughts and inspiration

"I pictured a low timber house with a shingled roof, caulked against storms, with blazing log fires inside and the walls lined with all the best books, somewhere to live when the rest of the world blew up."
— Bruce Chatwin (In Patagonia)


"I climbed a path and from the top looked up-stream towards Chile. I could see the river, glinting and sliding through the bone-white cliffs with strips of emerald cultivation either side. Away from the cliffs was the desert. There was no sound but the wind, whirring through thorns and whistling through dead grass, and no other sign of life but a hawk, and a black beetle easing over white stones."
— Bruce Chatwin (In Patagonia)


"And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time." 
— T.S. Eliot

"The creative act is a letting down of the net of human imagination into the ocean of chaos on which we are suspended, and the attempt to bring out of it ideas.

It is the night sea journey, the lone fisherman on a tropical sea with his nets, and you let these nets down - sometimes, something tears through them that leaves them in shreds and you just row for shore, and put your head under your bed and pray.

At other times what slips through are the minutiae, the minnows of this ichthyological metaphor of idea chasing.
But, sometimes, you can actually bring home something that is food, food for the human community that we can sustain ourselves on and go forward."
— Terence McKenna

"Every step you take is a step away from where you used to be."
— Brian Chargualaf


Images;  the collage above contains a stunning selection of images by film maker and artist Clare Langan , whose mysterious and evocative stills are hugely inspirational for me. As well it contains as a still from 'The Wilderness Downtown' - an  interactive short film by Chris Milk for Arcade Fire. Check it out - it's lovely.