World We Once Lived In

In twenty short books, Penguin Classics brings you the ideas that have changed the way we think and talk about the living Earth.

Over the past 75 years, a new canon has emerged. As life on Earth has become irrevocably altered by humans, visionary thinkers around the world have raised their voices to defend the planet, and affirm our place at the heart of its restoration. Their words have endured through the decades, becoming the classics of a movement. Together, these books show the richness of environmental thought, and point the way to a fairer, saner, greener world.

From the Congo Basin to the traditions of the Kikuyu people, these lucid, incisive writings explore the sacred power of trees, and why humans lay waste to the forests that keep us alive.