The wind in the Wild Wood

WITH a title and an epigraph which deliberately make reference to The Wind in the Willows, Tom McCaughren's new novel sets itself immediately within the tradition of a certain kind of animal story. The twin enemies of the genre - didacticism and sentimentality - are here debarred, their place taken by a narrative in which the various members of a selected animal community pursue their animal existences: fiction, natural history and ecological concern are thus able to blend, the whole suffused in intimations of that "divine discontent" which, on the opening page of Grahame's classic, is said to penetrate Mole's little home.

It is this "divine discontent" which shatters what otherwise might be an idyllic life for the fictional creatures of Grahame and McCaughren. More specifically, in Run to the Wild Wood the idyll is threatened by the needs of fox, badger and hare to submerge their individual destinies in the interests of a concerted effort to thwart man's encroaching destruction of their environment.

Survival is the primary goal, but there is a spiritual journey too which is an integral part of the animals' physical quest. The two most strikingly written chapters of the story - "The Year of the Snipe" and "The Year of the Fox" - are imbued with the same quasi mystical strain which characterises the "The Piper at the Gates of Dawn" section of Grahame's novel. In McCaughren's case, however, the prose can, so to speak, bear the strain there is none of the mawkish whimsy of Grahame's original.

In terms of structure, Run to the Wild Wood is in effect a tale of two journeys, both related with an extremely effective understanding of pace and setting. Fragrant Wood, which for generations has given shelter to the badgers, is being torn apart by man and his machinery. A new home has therefore to be found and the displaced animals enlist the aid of the foxes in their search. This is willingly granted and soon a hazardous voyage across often unfriendly terrain begins. Every move is supervised by Old Sage Brush, the elderly fox who, in spite of having been blinded by the "probing sticks", is endowed, Tiresias like, with a vision denied to many of those who, in a literal sense, can see.

While it is Old Sage Brush's wisdom which serves as a reassurance to the badgers and younger foxes on their trek, it is to the altogether more maverick fox known as Ratwiddle that they are indebted for the prophecies which, enigmatically phrased as they are, act simultaneously as an encouragement to proceed and a temptation to retreat. Particularly alluring is his dream of the man who stands on an eel and who sings like a cuckoo; a dream which, while easily dismissed at first as merely proof of an addled mind, is to assume a central thematic significance for the travellers (and readers). Few fictional animals have Ratwiddle's eccentric appeal and behind his creation there lies an inventive and playful imagination.

McCaughren's earlier fox stories have gained for him an international audience, drawn to his passionate interest in the natural world and his ability to translate that interest into a lyrical and graceful narrative. Run to the Wild Wood will not disappoint his admirers. It is, in many respects, his most ambitious undertaking to date, approachable on a number of levels, each of them yielding its own rich rewards. It is a pleasure to add that the quality of the writing is well matched by the quality of the book's production: full marks to the publisher, to Jeanette Dunne for her illustrations and to Aileen Caffrey for her front cover painting. {CORRECTION} 96110800090