Nearest Earthly Place to Paradise

Shropshire has inspired many writers over the centuries: its bucolic rolling fields and meadows, its dramatic wild hills and moors, its traditional market towns, its patchwork of copses and hedgerows, its bleak and beautiful mountains. 

Extracts from Charles Dickens to Tom Sharpe, from Katherine Swift to AE Housman, from Bill Bryson to Pete Postlethwaite, are matched with stunning photographs by Shropshire’s Geoff Taylor, who has captured the landscapes that drew out the words.

This elegant anthology of Shropshire-inspired literature also features extracts from Samuel Johnson, John Betjeman, DH Lawrence, John Masefield, Henry Kingsley, Wilfred Owen, Mary Webb, John Milton, Simon Evans, Henry James, Phil Rickman, Tim Pears, Roger Evans, Ellis Peters and many more.