I recently finished reading "Diary of a Young
Naturalist" by Dara McAnulty.
Dara McAnulty was born in
2004 and he lives with his close-knit family comprising his father, Paul, his mother Róisín, his younger siblings,
Lorcan and Bláthnaid plus Rosie, the rescue greyhound, in Castlewellan, a small town
in County Down in the south-east of Northern Ireland.
Dara was
diagnosed as autistic when he was 5 years old. In fact, Róisín, Lorcan and
Bláthnaid are also autistic and only Paul, a conservation scientist, is not.
Dara introduces
himself in his book by saying: “I’m Dara, a boy, an acorn . . . Our home is crammed with books, skulls,
feathers, politics, unbridled debates, tears, laughter and joy …. Not only is
our family bound together by blood, we are all autistic, except Dad — he’s the
odd one out. Together, we make for an eccentric and chaotic bunch. We are as
close as otters and, huddled together, we make our way in the world.”
Dara describes himself and his
remarkable journey in even more depth in his own blog .... My story so far. Asperger’s and Nature.
Dara wrote from
a young age on scraps of paper …. “One of my ways of processing the world is
writing things down”. Then social media helped him find a path. Aged 12, he
began a blog Naturalist Dara and won runner-up in the BBC Wildlife Magazine Blogger Awards. His blog also won the youth category for the Wildlife
Trusts “30 Days Wild 2017” campaign and won conservation group A Focus on
Nature “Best blog of 2016” competition.
Dara also joined
Twitter …. “Twitter opened my world to like-minded people …. It’s given me
so many opportunities to connect with people and not feel so isolated.”
As Dara continued
to write and as he took his first steps in environmental activism, campaigning
to end the persecution of birds of prey, his blog gained readers and admirers.
In June 2017, he appeared on BBC2 Springwatch and he was befriended by Chris Packham.
Adrian Cooper
and Gracie Burnett, the husband and wife team behind tiny independent publisher
LittleToller Books, then spotted his writing and began talking to his family
about a book.
I first became aware of Dara with that BBC2 Springwatch appearance and when he received the BBC Springwatch Unsprung Wildlife Hero Award from Chris Packham.
Last year, I also listened to online streamed interviews with Dara as part of Birdfair, the Cambridge Literary Festival and the Hay Festival.
Most recently, I commented here on some of the UK's young naturalists and campaigners, including Dara, .
In 2019, Dara won the RSPB Medal for his campaigning work against raptor
persecution and biodiversity loss (the youngest ever winner) and
in 2020 he won the Wainwright Prize for UK nature
writing (the youngest author to be shortlisted for the award).
.
Dara’s debut book “Diary of a Young Naturalist” was released in May 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic and health crisis. It details his intense connection to the natural world as an autistic teenager. It chronicles the turning of 14 year old Dara's world, from spring to summer, autumn to winter, on his own patch, at his school, in the wild and in his head. It also documents a significant change and psychological crisis in his life as he and his family move from their home in County Fermanagh to a new life on the other side of Northern Ireland in the shadow of the Mourne Mountains in County Down.
It is a book that succeeds in describing the deep and complex pleasure
of immersion in nature, written by an author who describes himself as having “the
heart of a naturalist, the head of a would-be scientist, and the bones of
someone already wearied by the apathy and destruction wielded against the
natural world .... The outpourings on these pages express my
connection to wildlife, try to explain the way I see the world, and describe
how we weather the storms as a family.”.
"Diary of a Young Naturalist" portrays and explores Dara's intense connection to the natural world and his personal perspective as an autistic teenager juggling education, homework, exams and friendships alongside his life as a conservationist and environmental activist.
Dara says: "In writing this book, I have experienced challenges but also felt incredible joy, wonder, curiosity and excitement. In sharing this journey my hope is that people of all generations will not only understand autism a little more but also appreciate a child's eye view on our delicate and changing biosphere."
Dara McAnulty is indeed autistic and it would be easy to file his book alongside Chris Packham’s “Fingers in the Sparkle Jar” which gave a vivid insight into his own experience living with Asperger’s syndrome but Dara definitely has his own distinctive style.
All of this makes his first book, “Diary of A Young
Naturalist”, a nature journal like no other you will read.
“Diary of A Young Naturalist” won the annual Wainwright Prize for UK Nature Writing for 2020 …. see here and here and here.
I’m an autistic teenager. I’m not polished. I don’t rehearse (sometimes I wish I did!). I’m raw and real and very very imperfect. But look what can happen, to an ordinary boy who had a story to tell, in all its rage and love. I forgot to say here - but THANK YOU TO MY FAMILY 🙌🙌 pic.twitter.com/IGCS1TCnAl
— Dara McAnulty (@naturalistdara) September 8, 2020
"Diary of a Young Naturalist" is an exceptional book written by an exceptional young man.
Well done Dara on a thoroughly deserved award.
Keep on writing.
Keep on campaigning for wildlife and a better natural world.
You are such an inspiration to young people, the neuro-diverse community and anyone that cares about the environment, nature and wildlife.
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