Linda Lear

“The part of the Lake District that Beatrix Potter chose as her own was not only physically beautiful, it was a place in which she felt emotionally rooted as a descendant of hard-working north-country folk. The predictable routines of farm life appealed to her. There was a realism in the countryside that nurtured a deep connection. The scale of the villages was manageable. Yet the vast desolateness of the surrounding fells was awe-inspiring. It was mysterious, but easily imbued with fantasy and tamed by imagination. The sheltered lakes and fertile valleys satisfied her love of the pastoral. The hill farms and the sheep on the high fells demanded accountability. There was a longing in Beatrix Potter for association with permanence: to find a place where time moved slowly, where places remained much as she remembered them from season to season and from year to year.”
― Linda Lear, Beatrix Potter: A Life in Nature

“Rachel’s field notes also contained lighter moments, as when she picked up a dime-size baby ghost crab. Afraid it did not know its way home, she made it a new hole with her finger in the sand. “He darted into it,” she wrote, “and we were both happy.”29”
― Linda Lear, Rachel Carson: Witness for Nature