Afterword - The Politics of Landscape Experience

Summary

When I began writing this book the best part of two decades ago, I hoped to find a single explanation for popular ruralism. It was a disappointment to discover that rural landscapes fitted into each of the diarists’ lives in a different way. However, on consideration I realized that hidden beneath this apparently multi-causal explanation was the mono-causal explanation I had been seeking. What the diarists looked for and what they took from the landscapes they were drawn to corresponded in each case to the distinctive assemblage of their psychological characteristics, refracted through the circumstances in which they found themselves. Since none of them had the same mix of characteristics or circumstances, it is unsurprising that landscape figured differently in each of their lives. Certainly there were some commonalities, and I have tried to draw attention to the most prominent of these through the Adherer–Withdrawer–Restorer–Explorer framework. But even within each of these categories there were wide differences in landscape experience. Of all the diarists, Cresswell and Hallam had most in common in the way they related to rural landscapes.