The Newt

Reading ‘The Lost Words’ by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris

The page I return to most often in The Lost Words is the one devoted to the newt.

The two-page spread shows a coot standing on a small rock above the water’s surface. Below the surface, the newt rises through the pale wash of the page, its indignant gaze fixed on the bird.

Credit: Jackie Morris, illustrator, The Lost Words, 2017

The poem begins:

‘Newt, oh newt, you are too cute!’ Emoted the coot to the too-cute newt,

With your frilly back and your shiny suit and your spotted skin so unhirsute!’

‘Too cute?!’ the newt roars. Newts are not cute, it insists. They are kings of the pond, lions of the duckweed, dragons of the water, before the newt pauses and mutters, ‘albeit…minute.’

The exchange is humorous, but it changes the way you look at the creature on the page. The newt is no longer just something to glance at and move past. It has presence, and a strong personality.

And so, you begin to notice the details. Finish reading on Substack.