The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees – The Ash in Human Culture and History

Product Information

A eulogy to the importance of ash throughout human history . . . Fascinating’ – Tobias Jones, Guardian What a fascinating read, just like Robert Penn and his Ash tree I got so much from this book. Penn one day decides to find the perfect ash tree, chop it down and see how many things he can make from it. Each chapter is based around an item being made, from Axe handles, to bowls, and even a deadly arrow. In the chapter you find out the history of how ash wood has been used to make that product, a history of it's use, how it is made and the person who Penn has located to make it. So many interesting little things to learn about. Over the next two years he travelled across Britain, to Europe and the USA, to the workshops and barns of a generation of craftsmen committed to working in wood. He watched them make over 45 artefacts and tools that have been in continual use for centuries, if not millennia.

To learn more, Penn decided to fell one and follow it as it was made into as many different things as possible. “I could get a writer’s desk and a table made,” he writes. “I would turn some of the less valuable timber into panelling for my office and worktops for my kitchen.” There would be plenty more besides, more than 40 different items in total, all from a single tree. Penn takes us through the various uses, with accompanying passages of history and science, sprinkled with trivia. A veteran writer and broadcaster, he has written several books on cycling and one on the weather, and has a keen eye for the interesting tangent. I hadn’t known, for instance, that the first Routemaster buses had ash frames.One of the most common uses for ash is tool handles. The experts are a little hazy about putting absolute date on when ash was first used, but it is safe to say that it has been used for several thousand years. The properties of ash make it the perfect material, it is tough, strong and flexible, not too heavy and the very act of handling the wood adds a patina to it making it nicer to handle. One of the last tool manufacturers in UK offer to turn some of his planks into axe handles, and he pays them a visit. In no time at all they are cut to shape, and sanded to the ideal shape. His first objects from that tree. Beautifully crafted, [ The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees ranges] freely over intellectual territory - masculinity, nostalgia, identity . . . Fascinating . . . Never have the benefits of getting your chopper out appeared more obvious (Robert Crampton, Books of the Year The Times) this book is going to be expensive. I am fairly committed now, to learning how to turn bowls. On an electric lathe, though, not a footy. So, Penn is less of a romantic figure turning his wood to good use, and more of a miniscule lumber merchant operating at (we can presume) considerable loss to turn an idealised tree into several artefacts, many of which he would seem to have no use for other than as chapters of this book. Penn is a fine writer, and the mix of research, reportage and personal reflection is persuasive . . . A lovely book (Ed Cumming Observer)

A soothing, somewhat rambling read that floats in the aether between something like travel writing and meditations on woodworking. Broadly inoffensive stylistically, and contains a number of tidbits of trivia about wood, woodworking and other related subjects. Reflections on the honest pleasures of craftsmanship make it all pretty easy to digest. I was annoyed at the first bit of the book as Penn discusses woodland management and tree surgery. Topics which I know a lot about and he just seemed like a standard 'tourist' wanted to play around on the edges of something cool, manly and dangerous. You come across these types when working as a tree surgeon. People who think they know shit about tree work because they own a shit chainsaw. As the book progressed however I did warm to it more as I learned bits about crafts I didn't know about. Penn has managed to talk to some cool, knowledgeable people. Incidentally I think I know someone who knows one of the wheelwrights from West Lancashire who the author goes to see. The chapter on hurley making was interesting too as well as the one where he gets the fletcher to make him a bodkin arrow. This book is very informative but also has very little to do with the title. The author makes nothing out of trees, and instead has a tree felled with the intent to make as much as possible from that one tree.. then often doesn't, because the different master crafters he takes stuff to have very specific or very high standards that his particular tree don't meet.

Retailers:

If ash’s past significance is undeniable, its future is less certain. Though Penn’s new items bring him a lot of pleasure, it is hard to argue that they are essential in the way they once were. His ash – as exemplified by his bespoke writing desk – is a luxury. Wood’s essential mystery – even today, scientists are only just starting to explain why different varieties have different characteristics – can also make it expensive and unreliable for mass production. An ash bowl is doubtless a lovely thing to have, but they will not be flying out of Ikea for a pound. But he does talk about his passion, ash trees, with encyclopedic depth and you can feel his reverence for this particular brand of tree. It's a bit much at times, in a "we get it, ash is very useful and has been forever" kind of way, but the best bits of this book are the points where he meanders through an unkempt history of the way ash was used in such and such country or region, and it is overall interesting and informative. An] extended tribute to the beauty and usefulness of the ash tree... A homage to vanishing skills that were once integral to the functioning of rural Britain (Tom Fort Literary Review) A wonderful journey and pleasure to read, I learnt a lot. However I feel this book is also a bit of a missed opportunity. Perhaps it helped that this was my second book from this Robert Penn (I read It's all about the bike) and my expectations were firm on the huge amount of passion coming through - on that the author delivered in full. He didn't mention the beauty of some of its grain patterns in different cuts well enough early on, although he did take his log to a sawmill. I found that section far too simplified & he never mentioned staining & finishing of ash compared to other woods. It does have large pores & that can be an issue with fine woodwork & writing surfaces. He mentions the grain patterns at the end, but doesn't get into staining at all, surprising since he wife should know.

There is something special about the stuff – using it, holding it, smelling it, walking around it – that connects us to our history and with which we risk losing touch. From his tree Penn has made a lovely book: part elegant history, part anxious lament. My favourite part of the book has to be Robin Wood and his bowl making, he uses a pole lathe, no electric lathe with CNC programming or big kilns for drying the wood, this is all done with man power. I've seen a pole lathe in action before and it is mesmerising, the fact that the wood worker can't see what he is doing as the wood turns and yet somehow create something smooth and beautiful is insane, I own a Spurtle (porridge stirrer) that was made on a pole lathe and it is a thing of beauty. He meets, among others, a hurley maker, a bowl turner, a toboggan maker and a cabinet-maker, in a journey that takes him two years and includes visits to Austria, the US and Ireland (the hurley maker, unsurprisingly). Many of the craftsmen are in family businesses and are in the main a dying breed. Penn writes that Tom Mareschall, an arrowsmith, is one of only six men left in the UK who can draw a longbow. It’s a long way from Agincourt, where clouds of ash arrows unhorsed ranks of French knights. This is a tale about the joy of making things in wood, of its touch and smell, its many uses and the resonant, calming effect of running our hands along a wooden surface. It is a celebration of man's close relationship with this greatest of natural materials and a reminder of the value of things made by hand and made to last.There is no greater debt than that which mankind owes to trees, and Robert Penn proves this brilliantly - a highly readable account of the multitude of uses one single ash tree can provide (Lars Mytting, author of 'Norwegian Wood') Out of all the trees in the world, the ash is most closely bound up with who we are: the tree we have made the greatest and most varied use of over the course of human history. One frigid winter morning, Robert Penn lovingly selected an ash tree and cut it down. He wanted to see how many beautiful, handmade objects could be made from it. There is some redundancy that was annoying. Structural & crushing strength of wood was one of these areas. He covered cell structure several times for the same reasons in arrows, tool handles, baseball bats.