‘Time To Slowly Step Down From Our Throne’
Humans and nature: a difficult relationship. In his latest book “Unser wildes Erbe” (Our Wild Legacy), the famous forest ranger and author Peter Wohlleben explores the question of how it can be that humans, as the supposedly most highly developed beings on this planet, are destroying their own habitat. On Saturday, he gave a reading from this book on the “Blue Sofa” at the sold-out Theater Gütersloh.
With his books about nature, Peter Wohlleben, who studied forestry and has worked as a civil servant in the state forestry administration for 20 years, has struck a chord with readers. At least those who are interested in forests and nature conservation, for quite a few of them will have asked themselves the very questions that Peter Wohlleben answers in his books when they spend time in nature: How does a tree work? Who owns the forest? Can trees communicate – and if so, how does this happen? These were among the many questions addressed at the latest “Blue Sofa Gütersloh” cultural event last Saturday. At the invitation of Bertelsmann Corporate Communications, the bestselling author, who has been a popular lecturer and guest on numerous TV shows for years, came to the Gütersloh’s sold-out theater to read from his new book “Unser wildes Erbe” (Our Wild Legacy), published by Ludwig-Verlag, and discuss it with the audience.
We humans are part of nature
In front of more than 500 guests, Peter Wohlleben went on to speak about a much wider range of subjects, including humans and our interaction with nature in his remarks. The author has already outlined the broad spectrum of topics that he is passionate about in his bestsellers “The Hidden Life of Trees” – which was also made into a film – “The Inner Life of Animals,” “The Secret Network of Nature,” “The Heartbeat of Trees,” and “The Power of Trees,” all published in their original German editions by Penguin Random House Verlagsgruppe. Wohlleben stressed that it is unacceptable that we, as supposedly the most highly developed beings on this planet, are destroying our own habitat, and gave numerous vivid and shocking examples of this overexploitation of all our resources. The author also gave an impassioned account of the fascination of nature, as motivation for a rethink or at least reflection. On his countless excursions into the world beyond cities and roads, he has experienced so many incidents involving flora and fauna that he could fill many more books with them – some of which the guests at the Gütersloh Theater have already heard. Here too, however, Wohlleben used passages from “Our Wild Legacy” to make it clear that we humans ourselves are also only part of this nature and interact intensively with it. Among other things, Wohlleben spoke about research findings from the earliest history of humankind as well as the supremacy of the subconscious in matters of food as a motivation for human actions and the possibilities of learning from other creatures of nature that do not destroy their own livelihoods – trees, for example. In total, the author read three passages from his book, followed by a discussion with the audience.
