Bibliographies

International Women Nature Writers

Date: Sat, 02 Dec 1995
From: Stephen Norwick "Stephen.Norwick@sonoma.edu"

I am afraid there may not be many women nature writers or they are not well known. I can only think of a few British women nature writers.

Jacquetta Hawkes, "A Land". N.Y.: Random House, 1951 might be British.

Susan Hill,  "The Magic Apple Tree. a country year". Engravings by John
Lawrence. London: Hamish Hamilton 1982

Edith Holden, "The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady" written about 1900 but not published until 1977. Hand lettered and water colored nature diary with lots of her favorite poems illustrated with the appropriate flowers and birds.

Frances Horovitz

Lilly Koenig, "Nature Stories from the Vienna Woods". N.Y.: Crowell, 1958

Juliette de Bairacli Levy, "Wanderers in the New Forest". London: Faber and Faber 1958

"Janet Marsh's Nature Diary" also with illustrations by the author.  London: Michael Joseph Publ. Yet another gentle and gentile English lady naturalist and water colorist.

R.A. Willmott, "A Journal of Summer Time in the Country". London: Scholartis, 1928

Wordsworth, Dorothy (1771 - 1855) "Journals 1798 - 1803". The much put upon sister of the great poet was a keen observer of nature and local customs.

There are a number of female animal story writers who might be British.
You could check on the following:

Neltje Blanchan (1865 - 1918) "Birds That Hunt and Are Hunted". 1898

Alice Gall and Fleming Crew, "Wagtail"  Oxford: Oxford University Press 1932

Carmen Bernos de Gasztold, "Prayers From the Ark". N.Y.: Viking Press 1947, 1955.  And "The Creatures' Choir"  N.Y.: Viking Press 1960, 1965 both books were translated from the French with a foreword and epilogue by Rumer Godden.

Mrs. Cherry  Keaton, "The Island of Penguins"

Dame Barbara Ward, "Spaceship Earth". The George B. Pegram Lectures
N.Y.: Columbia Univ. Press 1966. This is the book by the prominent British economist and environmentalist which popularized the image of the spaceship earth. Other books include
"The Home of Man"
"Progress for a Small Planet"
"Who Speaks for Earth"

Dame Barbara Ward and Rene Dubos "Only One Earth: the care and maintenance of a small planet". N.Y.: Norton 1972. A report to the U.N.

Here are some nature poetesses who might be British:

Grace Hazard Conkling, "Wilderness Songs" N.Y.: Henry Holt 1920 102pp

There may be British nature poetesses in this anthology: Gertrude Moore Richards, (Mrs. Waldo Richards)  ed. "The Melody of Earth: an anthology of garden and nature poems from present-day poets". N.Y.: Houghton Mifflin 1918

Margaret Craven, "I Hear The Owl Call My Name". N.Y.: Doubleday, 1973. A
religious novel about a young Anglican missionary  to the native Americans (native Canadians?) of coastal British Columbia including personal heroism and good nature descriptions with strange local customs. Many environmentalists find this book very troubling because it portrays native customs as disgusting and advocates conversion to European religion.
"Walk Gently This Good Earth". Putnam's 1977 
"Again Calls the Owl". N.Y.: Putnam's  1980 
"The Home Front"

There is a vast garden literature in Europe, and many of these authors are women, but I do not think you will find them interested in nature over the fence as it were. You might collect folk tales about nature from many cultures, many tales are told by women and have strong female characters who live in and sometimes admire or protect nature.