SUNDAY LECTURE: A HISTORY OF FELLWALKING IN THE ENGLISH LAK
Location
Higham Hall College
About
Many people today regard Alfred Wainwright as the patron saint of fellwalking. This is due to the high regard in which his seven-volume Pictorial Guides to the Lakeland Fells, published between 1955 and 1966, and the landscape he loved are held. Wainwright’s Pictorial Guides are part of a long history of English Lake District guidebooks and of exploration of the uplands of the region on foot for pleasure.
This talk highlights the relationship between guidebooks and the development of fellwalking as a leisure practice in the century beforeWainwright. It challenges the idea that fellwalking began with Wainwright but also argues that his significance is due in large part to how he reconciled many, although not all, of the themes and tensions which arose in preceding works.
This talk highlights the relationship between guidebooks and the development of fellwalking as a leisure practice in the century beforeWainwright. It challenges the idea that fellwalking began with Wainwright but also argues that his significance is due in large part to how he reconciled many, although not all, of the themes and tensions which arose in preceding works.