I grew up by the coast. That probably prompts visions of soft sand, smooth pebbles and blue sea. There was none of that. Instead I grew up in a busy town with docks where the sound of ship's horns were heard more than the sound of the waves. The beaches nearby were all stones or marshes. Definitely not idyllic, especially when plastic bottles and carrier bags were strewn across it. But it still had that slight salty tang to the air and the water was still bitter cold, as it is on any British beach. On a fine day the sea is bright blue, but most of the time it is a murky grey. When I look at this beach I see how humans have interacted with it.
But why don't I think this when I see golden sand, sharp cliffs, and clear blue sea? Lyme Regis, where the photo above was taken, had French sand, Norwegian rocks, and shingle from the Isle of Wight brought in as part of their coastal protection project. This project seeks to actively reduce the damage caused by coastal erosion and land slipping and prevent it in the future. The coastal erosion is natural, but has been especially damaging in the last 100 years as the construction of certain buildings has heightened the damaging effect of the erosion. My question is: what is it that make me see Lyme Regis as more 'natural' and idyllic than the coastlines I grew up with?
There is little aesthetic evidence of human interaction with the Lyme Regis coastal landscape other than the obvious houses, paths, and boats. Furthermore, Lyme Regis captures the notion of the pastoral, a mode of writing that celebrates nature as Eden-esque. As a holiday destination to retreat to, particularly in the summer months, it encompasses the key features of retreat and return, and idealisation common to the pastoral tradition. The quaint and colourful buildings tell of times gone by, giving Lyme Regis a sense of nostalgia, another trope of the pastoral.
The beaches I frequented when growing up, however, were bleak landscapes evoking the anti-pastoral tradition in literature. Emphasising reality; showing the problems nature presents; and demythologising the literary (and in this case, cultural) idea of the paradise, the anti-pastoral is the antithesis of the pastoral tradition. Scattered with bottles and plastic bags the beaches, with the Fawley oil refinery rising in the background, display the reality of human interaction with nature: taking without concern and only giving back pollution and litter. Just as the landscape itself is bleak, the view of our interaction with nature is equally bleak.
How can we reconcile these two views?
While our cultural view of Lyme Regis does not match the reality of the landscape and our interaction with it, the coastal protection project could be seen as including aspects of what Terry Gifford terms the post-pastoral. This seeks to create a balance between the pastoral and anti-pastoral tradition, allowing us to connect emotionally with nature while recognising the flaws we have created within it. The appreciation of the beauty that the Dorset coast has to offer has inspired its protection and preservation. Although this does not necessarily suggest a movement from awe to humility that reduces our hubris, it does recognise the fact that humans are a part of nature's creative-destructive processes. Furthermore, it offers an answer to Gifford's question 'if nature is culture, is culture nature?' The answer being that the beach, or the summer retreat of the beach (embodied by Lyme Regis), has become embedded in the English tradition. Needless to say, the coastal protection project does not fully answer all the questions Gifford suggests that the post-pastoral should raise, but it does begin to offer answers to some.
Will our cultural opinion of Lyme Regis, traditionally pastoral, inch into the post-pastoral? Only time will tell.
Bibliograpy
Dorestforyou.com Lyme Regis Coast protection Works, 2016. [Online] Available from: https://www.dorsetforyou.gov.uk/lyme [Accessed: 10/10/2016].
Gifford, Terry 'Pastoral, Anti-Pastoral and Post-Pastoral as Reading Strategies', 2012. [Online] Available from: http://www.terrygifford.co.uk/Pastoral%20reading.pdf [Accessed: 17/10/2016].
Photo by Daniel Palmer, previously unpublished.
