Susanne Wiborg
What landscape means to us
A foray through eight landscapes: Forest and meadow, moor and heath, fields and rivers, mountains and coasts that shape us - literarily, naturally, historically -, just as we have shaped them since the beginning of mankind.
We live in them, we live from them, and have done so for millennia. Everyone thinks they know them - but who are our landscapes really? What makes up their character, their interaction with us humans? Who embodies them perfectly? Are they wasteland or idyll, do they rather offer security or are they a repellent power? Which part of the image we have of the landscape that surrounds us is experience, which projection?
The uncanny forest, the dangerous moor, the bright and cheerful flower meadow, the fertile fields, the barren heath, the boisterous rivers, the indomitable sea with its coasts or the challenging mountains?
Where can you still find untouched nature, what is man-made, which ecosystems are even dependent on human management? How have inhabitants, visitors and conquerors shaped and molded a landscape? And above all: How has this diverse habitat been experienced and described by humans over thousands of years?
A literary, biological and historical foray through eight landscapes, from the coast to the mountains - an invitation to read, experience and open your eyes.