Jay Griffiths
Encyclopedia
Jay Griffiths is an award-winning British writer and author of Wild: An Elemental Journey, Pip Pip: A Sideways Look at Time, Anarchipelago and A Love Letter from a Stray Moon.
Biography=
Jay Griffiths was born in Manchester
, England
and grew up on the outskirts of London
. She once lived in a shed in Dial House, on the outskirts of Epping Forest
, and now lives in Mid Wales
. After studies at Oxford University, she traveled around the world visiting indigenous communities and learning from them. Her books are based on her learning and her travels. Griffiths has appeared in the London Review of Books
and has contributed to programmes on BBC Radio 4
and the World Service. Her columns have appeared in The Guardian
and The Ecologist
, and since 2009 she has been a columnist for Orion
magazine.
Jay Griffiths has also been a contributor at many cultural events including the Adelaide Festival of Ideas
, the More Than Us conference with David Abram
and Scottish artists Dalziel + Scullion
; the Royal Academy
with artists Ackroyd & Harvey
; the International Sacred Arts Festival in Delhi
and has been a part of the popular Radiolab podcasts. She has also been a supporter of the Aluna project, for which she gave a talk in the Hayward Gallery in March 2007.
with shamans in the Amazon
, as a treatment for depression, and discusses shamanism
, nomadism and freedom
. Various chapters describe journeys to the Arctic
, to Australia
and to the freedom fighters
of West Papua.
Wild is quoted on KT Tunstall's
album Tiger Suit and has been nominated by KT Tunstall as her number one favorite book. The Strokes bassist Nikolai Fraiture reads from Wild during their documentary for their album Angles.
In April 2011, Radiohead
guitarist Ed O'Brien
posted a recommendation of Wild on the band's blog, stating that it is "an astonishing piece of writing " and that "it was exactly what I needed to read".
referred to it as ‘remarkable’ and ‘stupendous’ while The Guardian
wrote: “Jay Griffiths is a five-star, card-carrying member of the hellfire club... a strange, utterly compelling book, Wild is easily the best, most rewarding travel book that I have read in the last decade.” For The Sunday Times
Anthony Sattin wrote “There is no getting away from the book's brilliance” and The Independent on Sunday referred to Wild "as a song of delight, and a cry of warning, poetic, erudite and insistent… a restless, unstintingly generous performance..." and The Times
referred to "kaleidoscopic narrative", "exhilarating prose". Wild was successful in Australia where it received positive reviews in the Sydney Morning Herald, described by Bruce Elder as "The best book I read all year". During an interview about the experiences discussed in Wild, Griffiths said, "To my mind, at worst, the West operates a kind of ‘intellectual apartheid’ – the idea that our way of thinking is the only one. Really, there are more ways of living and thinking than we could ever imagine."
as a political subject, showing how indigenous cultures have diverse ways of considering time (past, present and future) but illustrating how one, single, Europe
an time is colonizing all these varieties of time. It is a manifesto for cyclical time and for the times of nature, of carnival, of play: and argues that women’s time is different from men’s.
as “A wonderful, delightfully humorous polemic against everything that’s wrong with the way we deal with time today”. The New Scientist described it as “A whirl of a book. Any page will get you hooked” and The New Internationalist called it: “Splendid, extraordinarily wide-ranging, emphasizing the political import of the subject. Impressive, absorbing and radical, provocative, impassioned, often outrageously witty.”
.
Awards=
Pip Pip: A Sideways Look at Time won the Barnes & Noble
Discover Award for the best new non-fiction writer in the USA, 2003. “Jay Griffiths has produced nothing short of an original opening of the human mind… Her book is cleverness in the service of genius.” (Citation on winning the Barnes and Noble “Discover” award).
Wild won the inaugural Orion Book Award for 2007, was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize
in 2008 and the Spread The Word World Book Day Award 2009.
Biography=
Jay Griffiths was born in Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
and grew up on the outskirts of London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. She once lived in a shed in Dial House, on the outskirts of Epping Forest
Epping Forest
Epping Forest is an area of ancient woodland in south-east England, straddling the border between north-east Greater London and Essex. It is a former royal forest, and is managed by the City of London Corporation....
, and now lives in Mid Wales
Mid Wales
Mid Wales is the name given to the central region of Wales. The Mid Wales Regional Committee of the National Assembly for Wales covered the counties of Ceredigion and Powys and the area of Gwynedd that had previously been the district of Meirionydd. A similar definition is used by the BBC...
. After studies at Oxford University, she traveled around the world visiting indigenous communities and learning from them. Her books are based on her learning and her travels. Griffiths has appeared in the London Review of Books
London Review of Books
The London Review of Books is a fortnightly British magazine of literary and intellectual essays.-History:The LRB was founded in 1979, during the year-long lock-out at The Times, by publisher A...
and has contributed to programmes on BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
and the World Service. Her columns have appeared in The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
and The Ecologist
The Ecologist
The Ecologist is a British environmental publication founded in 1970 by Edward Goldsmith. It addresses a wide range of environmental subjects and promotes an ecological systems thinking approach through its news stories, investigations and opinion articles. The Ecologist encourages its readers to...
, and since 2009 she has been a columnist for Orion
Orion (magazine)
Orion is a bimonthly, advertisement-free, magazine focused on nature, the environment, and culture, addressing environmental and societal issues....
magazine.
Jay Griffiths has also been a contributor at many cultural events including the Adelaide Festival of Ideas
Adelaide Festival of Ideas
The Adelaide Festival of Ideas has been held every two years since 1999 over a period of three or four days in October at venues throughout Adelaide in the alternate year to the long-established Adelaide Festival of Arts....
, the More Than Us conference with David Abram
David Abram
David Abram is an American philosopher, cultural ecologist, and performance artist, best known for his work bridging the philosophical tradition of phenomenology with environmental and ecological issues...
and Scottish artists Dalziel + Scullion
Dalziel + Scullion
Dalziel + Scullion are Scottish based artists Matthew Dalziel and Louise Scullion who have worked in collaboration since 1993; their studio creates artworks in photography, video, sound and sculpture that explore new artistic languages surrounding the subject of ecology. Dalziel + Scullion...
; the Royal Academy
Royal Academy
The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...
with artists Ackroyd & Harvey
Ackroyd & Harvey
Ackroyd & Harvey are visual artists who have collaborated since 1990.Ecology, architecture, sculpture, and photography are some of the disciplines that intersect in Ackroyd & Harvey’s work, revealing an intrinsic bias towards process and event...
; the International Sacred Arts Festival in Delhi
Delhi
Delhi , officially National Capital Territory of Delhi , is the largest metropolis by area and the second-largest by population in India, next to Mumbai. It is the eighth largest metropolis in the world by population with 16,753,265 inhabitants in the Territory at the 2011 Census...
and has been a part of the popular Radiolab podcasts. She has also been a supporter of the Aluna project, for which she gave a talk in the Hayward Gallery in March 2007.
Wild: An Elemental Journey
Wild is Jay Griffiths' second book. It describes an odyssey to wildernesses of earth, ice, water, air and fire, exploring the connection between human society and wild lands. It is also a journey into wild mind, as Griffiths explores the words and meanings which shape our ideas and experience of our own wildness, the wildness of the human spirit. The book includes the description of drinking ayahuascaAyahuasca
Ayahuasca is any of various psychoactive infusions or decoctions prepared from the Banisteriopsis spp. vine, usually mixed with the leaves of dimethyltryptamine-containing species of shrubs from the Psychotria genus...
with shamans in the Amazon
Amazon Basin
The Amazon Basin is the part of South America drained by the Amazon River and its tributaries that drains an area of about , or roughly 40 percent of South America. The basin is located in the countries of Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, and Venezuela...
, as a treatment for depression, and discusses shamanism
Shamanism
Shamanism is an anthropological term referencing a range of beliefs and practices regarding communication with the spiritual world. To quote Eliade: "A first definition of this complex phenomenon, and perhaps the least hazardous, will be: shamanism = technique of ecstasy." Shamanism encompasses the...
, nomadism and freedom
Freedom
-Philosophy:* Free will, the ability to make choices* Political freedom, in the context of the relationship of the individual to the state* Economic freedom-Computing:...
. Various chapters describe journeys to the Arctic
Arctic
The Arctic is a region located at the northern-most part of the Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, Russia, Greenland, the United States, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Iceland. The Arctic region consists of a vast, ice-covered ocean, surrounded by treeless permafrost...
, to Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
and to the freedom fighters
Free Papua Movement
The Free Papua Movement is a militant organisation established in 1965 to encourage and effect the violent overthrow of the current governments in the Papua and West Papua provinces of Indonesia, formerly known as Irian Jaya to secede from Indonesia, and to reject economic development and...
of West Papua.
Wild is quoted on KT Tunstall's
KT Tunstall
Kate Victoria "KT" Tunstall is a Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist from St Andrews, Scotland. She broke into the public eye with a 2004 live solo performance of her song "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree" on Later... with Jools Holland...
album Tiger Suit and has been nominated by KT Tunstall as her number one favorite book. The Strokes bassist Nikolai Fraiture reads from Wild during their documentary for their album Angles.
In April 2011, Radiohead
Radiohead
Radiohead are an English rock band from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, formed in 1985. The band consists of Thom Yorke , Jonny Greenwood , Ed O'Brien , Colin Greenwood and Phil Selway .Radiohead released their debut single "Creep" in 1992...
guitarist Ed O'Brien
Ed O'Brien
Edward John O'Brien is an English musician, songwriter and guitarist for the rock band Radiohead. He is also responsible for harmony vocals during live concerts and on many tracks from the band's albums...
posted a recommendation of Wild on the band's blog, stating that it is "an astonishing piece of writing " and that "it was exactly what I needed to read".
Reviews
On publication in the UK, Wild was praised widely in major newspapers and described as ‘part travelogue, part call to arms and wholly original... A vital, unique and uncategorisable celebration of the spirit of life’. The IndependentThe Independent
The Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
referred to it as ‘remarkable’ and ‘stupendous’ while The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
wrote: “Jay Griffiths is a five-star, card-carrying member of the hellfire club... a strange, utterly compelling book, Wild is easily the best, most rewarding travel book that I have read in the last decade.” For The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times is a British Sunday newspaper.The Sunday Times may also refer to:*The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times...
Anthony Sattin wrote “There is no getting away from the book's brilliance” and The Independent on Sunday referred to Wild "as a song of delight, and a cry of warning, poetic, erudite and insistent… a restless, unstintingly generous performance..." and The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
referred to "kaleidoscopic narrative", "exhilarating prose". Wild was successful in Australia where it received positive reviews in the Sydney Morning Herald, described by Bruce Elder as "The best book I read all year". During an interview about the experiences discussed in Wild, Griffiths said, "To my mind, at worst, the West operates a kind of ‘intellectual apartheid’ – the idea that our way of thinking is the only one. Really, there are more ways of living and thinking than we could ever imagine."
Pip Pip: A Sideways Look at Time
Jay Griffiths' first book, it explores TimeTime
Time is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects....
as a political subject, showing how indigenous cultures have diverse ways of considering time (past, present and future) but illustrating how one, single, Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
an time is colonizing all these varieties of time. It is a manifesto for cyclical time and for the times of nature, of carnival, of play: and argues that women’s time is different from men’s.
Reviews
The book was described by The IndependentThe Independent
The Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
as “A wonderful, delightfully humorous polemic against everything that’s wrong with the way we deal with time today”. The New Scientist described it as “A whirl of a book. Any page will get you hooked” and The New Internationalist called it: “Splendid, extraordinarily wide-ranging, emphasizing the political import of the subject. Impressive, absorbing and radical, provocative, impassioned, often outrageously witty.”
A Love Letter from a Stray Moon
This short novel is published by Text Publishing. It is a novel partly based on the life of Frida KahloFrida Kahlo
Frida Kahlo de Rivera was a Mexican painter, born in Coyoacán, and perhaps best known for her self-portraits....
.
Awards=
Pip Pip: A Sideways Look at Time won the Barnes & Noble
Barnes & Noble
Barnes & Noble, Inc. is the largest book retailer in the United States, operating mainly through its Barnes & Noble Booksellers chain of bookstores headquartered at 122 Fifth Avenue in the Flatiron District in Manhattan in New York City. Barnes & Noble also operated the chain of small B. Dalton...
Discover Award for the best new non-fiction writer in the USA, 2003. “Jay Griffiths has produced nothing short of an original opening of the human mind… Her book is cleverness in the service of genius.” (Citation on winning the Barnes and Noble “Discover” award).
Wild won the inaugural Orion Book Award for 2007, was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize
Orwell Prize
The Orwell Prize used to be regarded as the pre-eminent British prize for political writing.Three prizes are awarded each year: one for a book, one for journalism and another for blogging...
in 2008 and the Spread The Word World Book Day Award 2009.