Rebecca Smith Discusses Rural: The Lives of the Working Class Countryside

Monday, 6 November, 2023 1 p.m. – 2 p.m.
Creative Conversations – University Chapel, Glasgow University Memorial Chapel University Avenue Glasgow G12 8QQ
Rebecca Smith is a writer and radio producer, and graduate of the MLitt in Creative Writing at University of Glasgow. In this beautifully observed book, Rebecca Smith traces the stories of foresters and millworkers, miners, builders, farmers and pub owners, to paint a picture of the working class lives that often go overlooked.
Living in rural areas means being surrounded by natural beauty, but for many it also demands hard work, precarity, fewer opportunities and – increasingly – being pushed out of the place your family might have called home for generations. In Rural, Rebecca Smith brings together the reasons we all love nature with the histories of life in its midst, and a prescient look at the dynamics for rural areas today. Why are our farmers struggling to make a profit on a pint of milk? What has Airbnb done to small communities in places like the Lake District?
In a gorgeous tour of Scotland, England and Wales, this is a book for anyone who loves and longs for the countryside, whose family owes something to a bygone trade, or who is interested in the future of rural Britain.
Creative Conversations is funded by the Ferguson Bequest. This event will also be accessible on Zoom. A Link will be sent out on the day.
Free event
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