Ronald Blythe, beloved nature writer, editor, essayist and champion of the English countryside, has passed away, a few months after marking his 100th birthday.
Ronald was born and spent his entire life in or near Suffolk, and is perhaps best known for Akenfield: Portrait of an English Village, an evocative account of agricultural life in the county from the turn of the century to the 1960s. He wrote a number of books over the course of his lengthy career, as well as ‘Word from Wormingford,’ a long-running and highly praised weekly column in the Church Times.
Ronald was named a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1969 and was awarded the prestigious Benson Medal in 2006 in recognition of a lifetime’s achievement. He was appointed CBE in 2017.
Next to Nature: A Lifetime in the English Countryside, a collection of his writings, was published in 2022 to coincide with Ronald’s centenary.
Regarded by many as ‘an English institution’, Ronnie will be missed for his beautiful writing, his fascination with the lives of others, his deep sense of wonder and delight in nature, and the gentle warmth he bestowed on those who were lucky to call him a friend.
Photo credit: Eamonn McCabe, The Guardian