Richard Mabey

Richard Mabey (born 20 February 1941) is a biologist and author.

He has been called by The Times 'Britain's greatest living nature writer'. Among his acclaimed publications are Food for Free, The Unofficial Countryside and The Common Ground, as well as his study of the nightingale, Whistling in the Dark. His book about Gilbert White won the 1986 Whitbread Biography of the Year. Richard Mabey devised, researched and wrote the ground breaking bestseller Flora Britannica, which won the British Book Awards’ Illustrated Book of the Year and the Botanical Society of the British Isles’ President’s Award and was runner-up for the BP Natural World Book Prize.

Between 2000 and 2002 Mabey suffered with depression and his book Nature Cure, which describes his experiences and recovery in the context of man’s relationship with landscape and nature, was short-listed for three major literary awards, the Whitbread Biography of the Year, the Royal Society of Literature’s Ondaatje Prize for evoking the spirit of place and the J.R. Ackerley Prize for Autobiography.

Richard Mabey contributes frequently to BBC radio. ‘The Scientist and the Romantic', a series of five essays in which he discussed his lifelong relationship with science and the natural environment, were broadcast on Radio 3 in 2009.

He appeared in the 1975 BBC programme In Deepest Britain, with John Gooders and other naturalists, giving an unscripted narration of the wildlife observed during a country walk. He also wrote and narrated the 1996 BBC television series Postcards from the Country, for whose eight, 40- minute episodes he was series producer, as well as being the producer- director on four. His books The Unofficial Countryside and The Flowering of Britain were also made into BBC TV series. He made films for the BBC on Kew Gardens and The Yorkshire Dales.

In the 1980s he sat on the UK government’s advisory body, the Nature Conservancy Council. He has been awarded two Leverhulme Fellowships, and honorary doctorates by St Andrews and Essex universities for his contributions to nature writing. He was appointed to the Civil List in 2008 for services to literature. He is a Director of the arts and conservation charity Common Ground, Vice-President of the Open Spaces Society and Patron of the John Clare Society.

Mabey has also written on countryside and art issues for The Times, The Guardian, The Independent, Granta and Resurgence. A selection of these writings was compiled as the book Country Matters. He has written a personal column in BBC Wildlife magazine since 1984.