“It is a good life, a seal's, here in these shallow waters. Like the lives of so many air and water creatures, it seems a better one than ours. We have no element. Nothing sustains us when we fall.” — J.A. Baker Copy Share Image
“Their rapid, shifting, dancing motion had been so deft and graceful that it was difficult to believe that hunger was the cause of it… — J.A. Baker Copy Share
“Dark against the bright rust of the dead leaves, an unfledged starling lay flabbily upon its back. It was loose-skinned, helpless, and frog-like. Its… — J.A. Baker Copy Share
“For an hour, till greyness covered all, the water shone like milk and mother-of-pearl. The sea breathed quietly, like a sleeping dog.” — J.A. Baker Copy Share
“And for the partridge there was the sun suddenly shut out, the foul flailing blackness spreading wings above, the roar ceasing, the blazing knives… — J.A. Baker Copy Share
“The unchecked growth of many summers, rising and declining, has lessened the penetration of the light in a way one rarely sees in farmland… — J.A. Baker Copy Share
“It is a good life, a seal's, here in these shallow waters. Like the lives of so many air and water creatures, it seems… — J.A. Baker Copy Share
“It is an effort to descend down the hand-holds of memory to the plain beneath, to recall the lost future, the dusk hovering above… — J.A. Baker Copy Share
“Bar-tailed godwits flying with curlew, with knot, with plover; seldom alone, seldom settling; snuffling eccentrics; long-nosed, loud-calling sea-rejoicers; their call a snorting, sneezing, mewing,… — J.A. Baker Copy Share
“The trees did not reflect the sun so much as glow from within, as though their bark was of parchment, a membrane through which… — J.A. Baker Copy Share
“This is now a different place from what it was two hours ago. There is no mysterious essence we can call a 'place'. Place… — J.A. Baker Copy Share
“Typical, isn’t it? Just when you start to think your tiny existence isn’t so bad after all, something comes along and gives you a… — J.A. Baker Copy Share
