Women Academics From England

"In the long run, extinctions of species are as inevitable as the deaths of individual animals, and it may be that the causes of extinctions are as varied as the causes of individual deaths.A wave of extinctions—a sudden diminution in the number of species—is analogous to a sudden big drop in the size of a human population, an event that deserves to be explained even though the individual people would inevitably have died sooner or later anyway. Catastrophes in human populations have many causes: war, famine, and pestilence are the possibilities that first spring to mind. There may be equally many causes for evolutionary catastrophes, as waves of extinctions could well be called. Another possibility, however, is that extinctions come in waves that are part of a recurring cycle. It would then be the cycle itself, rather than each individual wave in the cycle, that would need to be explained. If there is such a cycle, it presumably follows a cycle in the inorganic world, such as cyclic climactic changes."

"From the time the European invaders of North America established themselves and began keeping records, the bitter winters of the Little Ice Age become part of written history.From that point also, the natural history of northern North America began to deviate from its “natural” course. The continent was no longer isolated. The foreign invaders multiplied rapidly, destroying native ecosystems at an ever increasing rate. In time, the byproducts of technology began to poison earth, water, and air and have now begun to influence the climate. The measured responses of biosphere to climate, and of climate to astronomical controls have, for the foreseeable future, come to an end."

"This whole journey started with '. Robin Wall Kimmerer wrote such an amazing book to connect botany and ecology with traditional knowledge. I also very much looked at other nature writers. ’s book was really interesting. He didn’t necessarily talk about the science of geology, but he did talk about what it felt like to be underground. There are moments in that book which terrify me because it makes me feel so claustrophobic. He makes you feel quite powerful emotions about being with him while he goes on that journey. Another book that really taught me how to structure the stories is by and it’s called Mudlarking. She’s this brilliant, interesting person who walks along the foreshore of the at and each chapter is about the different categories of the things that she finds. And finally the last book which I thought was so powerful as a woman writer was ’s The Living Mountain. She really lives in the moment of observing nature and natural processes. And not just the living processes of nature—what I love about that book is how she observes the rocks, the mountain and the landscape. She feels it in her heart, in every fiber of her being. And through reading that I knew what I wanted to achieve."

"... The Whispers of Rock: Stories from the Earth ... is a love letter written with such passion that you can’t help but be moved. Khatwa has devoted much of her life to spreading the gospel of geology, and here she offers clinical, scientific substance to back up her extraordinary depth of feeling. Throughout the book, she is methodical in her explanations of subjects such as how mountains, s and are formed, while also weaving in fascinating details. We learn that the Taj Mahal in India, an iconic symbol of love, was constructed with ivory-white , the origins of which date back to when several primitive land masses collided nearly 2 billion years ago. A recipe incorporating those , , and led to the rock used in this extraordinary monument, a much more complex process than might be realised at first glance. ... Khatwa’s love of rocks emerged as a child, when she walked over . In her book, she takes us with her around the world and across aeons, all the way to her home of 20 years in , UK, where the and its 185 million years of geological history are her neighbours."

".. even at the age of eight I had a great love for science, and I knew that I wanted to be a scientist."

"From my perspective as an and as a presenter on television I would love people to know and understand the amazing story of the s under our feet. The fact that without these rocks, the beds of , , clay or even s we would not have the or that we have today. We wouldn’t have the s, trees and wildlife without these rocks. Everything about the countryside is dependent on the rocks that sit underneath the soil, and I would love for people to know and make the connection that the nature they see all exists because of the rocks beneath. The rocks also have an ancient story of earth hidden within them that require us to use our imagination, we have to go back hundreds of millions of years to work out why they are there and can even tell us about the future of climate change."

"God, who entrusts to us their religious education, has a right to be set before them as truly, as nobly, as worthily as our capacity allows, as beautifully as human language can convey the mysteries of faith, with the quietness and confidence of those who know and are not afraid, and filial pride in the Christian inheritance which is ours. The child has a right to learn the best that it can know of God, since the happiness of its life, not only in eternity but even in time, is bound up in that knowledge."

"Thousands of , , , , , and are being planted, to create habitats of indigenous – of tree cover and open grazing. A flickered along the prickly spine of the new fence built to separate the sheep from the trees. Further on, beyond a bank of glacial , the infant disappeared behind a drystone wall above what was once a but has become a dry ochre basin of ' grasses. Canalised in a previous century, the Mint is to be re-meandered to its original course through the valley bottom, and Dub Ings will become a tarn once more. Like the new trees, this work – done in partnership with and another local farm – is intended to lessen the effects of flooding on communities further downstream; the memory of is never far away."

"As well as the human remains, the jawbone of a was unearthed at . Lynx became extinct in the UK about 1,800 years ago, but I found it exciting to think of these beautiful, lithe creatures roaming over my home landscape. There were the bones of a 7,000-year-old that had most likely been dragged up to the cave by an animal. And a short distance away, in fact just an arrow's flight from Kirkhead Tower, is , the place where the last wolf in England was reputedly killed. And although this idea might be fanciful (how on earth would anyone know where the very last wolf died anyway?), there's evidence of wolves right here on the doorstep. had been roaming northern Britain over 1,300 years ago and their bones were found in the cavern. They had been gnawed by a large predator. The most likely candidate? Wolf."

"The remains unambiguous, but still the fox hunts continue. Since the ban came into force more than ten years ago, I've seen — or more often heard — a number of hunts in progress. I've heard hounds in tracking rapidly across the open ground of the higher s, their baying echoing around the valley. Or down by the , men with s, turning to see who was driving past. Up here in , the hunt has always been on foot, but for all the lack of pomp and , and money, I still loathe it."

"In 1992, almost 2,000 of the world's leading scientists presented us with another way of looking at the world. In , they informed us that the current trajectory of was unsustainable. ... ... Some of us see what is happening but have little ability to act. Others see something else entirely because maintaining the juggernaut of the and is the priority. For them, the does little but get in the way."

"From the discovery of , we know that the once existed over a much larger range extending into Burma and northern Vietnam in the south, in China almost as far north as Beijing, the capital, and near Hong Kong and Shanghai in the east. Changes in climate reduced some of the panda's range, but in the twentieth century, the prime factor has been the rapid encroachment of the human population on the . As native forests have been logged or clear-cut for agriculture, suitable panda habitat has continued to shrink, until today it is confined to six mountain ranges running southwest from south of to south of along the eastern edge of the ."

"As the sun dips towards the horizon, a huge white ice arch becomes suffused with a pink glow. In front of this amazing backdrop hundreds of s huddle together as the temperature plummets to -30ºC. It had taken me almost 2 weeks to reach this part of in an and several hours trudging over the ice to reach this spot, but I knew this moment would live with me forever. As I savoured the pristine wilderness, I reflected that had I chosen another path as a career I would never have experienced this magical moment. By the time I married Martin (a fellow zoologist) at the age of 23, I presumed I would carve out a career as a for life. After all, I had a zoology degree and had been doing marine biological research for 3 years. I never dreamt I would abandon my love for the marine world and develop an even greater passion for photography. Yet, it was only a few years later that I took the plunge to work as a freelance ."

"Colour is of prime importance to life on earth: plants use it to attract s and to aid dispersal of their fruit; animals use it to attract mates, as s and as ."

"In addition to photographing flowers extensively on both sides the Atlantic, I have been fortunate to work in locations as diverse as South Africa, China, the Galápagos Islands, the high Arctic, the , and the Himalayas, and to participate in an unforgettable pony trek to Kashmir. Photographing garden flowers may not involve such intrepid expeditions, but it can be equally challenging and rewarding nonetheless. In fact, the current vogue of s has blurred the traditional distinctions between garden flowers and ."

"flowers show various adaptations to attract s—in the form of colour, pattern or scent or a combination of these factors. Flowers which are pollinated by butterflies and moths are usually heavily scented, especially those which are visited at night."

"became a and a in an age when books appeared to have the potential to change the world. Between 1760 and 1809, the years of Johnson's adulthood, Britain experienced a during which nothing was certain and everything seemed possible. On paper charted the evolution of Britain's relationship first with America and then with Europe: several were intimately involved in the struggles that reformed the ."

"As with all the best s, Hay makes her readers drag their feet towards the end, reluctant to part company with people she has made us know and feel for. Her book has turned the ’ uneven romance into a real love story. How pleased they would have been."

"In 1980 Earl Anderson published an article in ' on the history of foot races in which he characterised the old women's race in ' as a delightful instance. That view, thankfully, is not replicated elsewhere. Pioneering Burney scholars, including and Kristina Straub, have read the race as symbolic of a social system that dehumanises women and is a literalisation of male brutality."

"In common with other young writers whose lives were linked with theirs, Shelley, Keats and Byron were indebted to an earlier trio of Romantic poets, Wordsworth, Coleridge and Blake, whose work marked a striking break with the rational, of the early eighteenth century. This break had a profound effect on literary culture in the decades following the French Revolution. Unlike Blake, whose work remained largely unread for decades after his death, Wordsworth and Coleridge were famous in their own time. Contemporaries of both poets were startled by the distinctiveness of their work, and by the ."

"We are going to see massive changes related to AI. In the next 5-10 years, engineering is going to embedded into every aspect of life and will play a bigger role"

"I believe that the trade links between the Netherlands and UK are very important, and that because of these long-term ties we are trusted partners."

"Daisy Hay’s nuanced readings of Mary Shelley’s works, combined with photographs of manuscripts, books or physical artefacts from the collection, give readers a vivid picture of Mary Shelley’s time and how she translates life into art. As Hay in the concluding chapter argues, Frankenstein—as a productive, ethical and political metaphor—articulates the anxieties of an age inundated with , innovations and sudden changes."

"UtterBerry is currently classed as an SME and we are headquartered in London. Last year we announced that Utterberry is opening its new manufacturing and innovation hub in Leeds, England and we are looking to expand into other countries in the coming years."

"During a state visit a few years ago, when I had the honour of meeting the His Majesty the King and Her Majesty the Queen of the Netherlands, I became involved with NBCC."

"I was invited to Mansion House in London to demonstrate our technology and speak about UtterBerry’s work on Crossrail. After this, I became involved in various NBCC meetings, working on ways to increase trade between our countries."

"Our technology is developed with a long-term vision, not just adding technology but making sure it’s useful technology, working with partners to approach problems that our technology can solve both now and in the future."

"As someone whose life was saved by my own hospital, I would say if you’re really ill I would go to the NHS – I would not go to a private hospital"

"To me everything has to work round family, and fortunately it has"

"I found there was a field called photoelectrochemistry, invented by the American military in its attempts to build a solar rechargeable battery"

"Fidelity is a great quality but kindness, loyalty and resilience are also very important in bad times."

"I’m tempted to quote Lady Longford on her husband, the Labour peer and prison reformer:when asked, 'Have you ever thought of divorce?’, she replied, 'Divorce never; murder, frequently’."

"Intimations of old age are much easier to face together. That’s not to say the marriage gets easier, but it would be very much harder growing old without each other."

"The first thing I’d do would be to try to curtail population growth, because that puts a strain on so many resources as well as energy – food, land, housing. And that appears to be a question of economic development"

"The debt crisis, losing the house, losing the security that you need when you are the mother of two small children, making a completely new life, that was the toughest thing I have ever done."

"Lots of things go on in lots of marriages that are less than ideal and mostly they stay private and that’s how it really should be."

"The second judge treated me as if I was a liar, but I don’t move easily. I stand my ground."

"I looked around and I thought, ‘there aren’t many women here’, and then I thought, and this is a very female thing to think, ‘I’m never going to keep up with this lot’, and it was one of my larger surprises when I discovered I was well up with that lot!"

"I'm not in the business of writing my story."

"There is something fairly deeply ingrained in our culture, and there probably is a real difference in early reading ability – girls are way ahead."

"A partnership is about helping your partner in time of difficulty. That is when it matters. I am just not a quitter."

"Onshore wind power to me is clean and green, although some people dislike it. It’s the cheapest form of energy, so these things will take their place"

"I’ve always loved my work"

"“It sounds extraordinary, but it’s a fact that balance sheets can make fascinating reading.”"

"By bringing physical and mental healthcare together for the first time and embedding research at the heart of the hospital, we will treat the whole child, not just their illness"

"I think, on a , what I’d really appreciate are long books: books as day-by-day companions, to combat loneliness and fear. We have some brilliant contemporary authors who write on the big canvas, yet I feel that desert-island panic might be better combated by novels set in the past, preferably by long-dead authors who had never experienced central heating or modern dentistry. Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina, Balzac’s ' and Trollope’s ' (all with vibrant and courageous female protagonists, to spur me on to valour and fortitude) would be among my front runners. Reading contemporary novels would remind me, hour after hour, of the world I’d lost and might never regain. Tolstoy, on the other hand, reveals to me a universe I may never manage to understand in its entirety, so when I get to the end, I can happily start at the beginning again."

"Give history to children in the form of lists of dates or lumps of data and they won’t respond to it at all, but give them an image King Charles II, say, , or a defeated Napoleon staring out at an empty ocean from the cliffs of ) and this could be something which might move and inspire them."

"... each page breathes a kind of magic, a sigh of enchantment that’s hard to capture in a short review. Somehow, Tremain has imbued her 16th novel with the freshness – and the intense bitter-sweetness – of a first book of the very best kind. Its themes of adolescence and betrayal, high style and evocation of period, remind me of Françoise Sagan’s equally slim ', though its particular also sets it apart from that book. And while the young Marianne lives in semi-rural Berkshire, and likes horses more than most human beings – the novel’s horsey sections will perhaps seem peculiar to readers who didn’t grow up on Anna Sewell or – its author’s careful delineation of her parents’ brittle, golf-club ways recalls Julian Barnes’s suburban-set . The details are exquisite. Here are bath cubes, and , and sauces made from marmalade to go with baked ham ..."

"Its thesis, that success for a woman is perhaps more broadly based than for a man, is absolutely true."

"try to avoid the boom and bust that afflicts the development of renewables. I’m not a hair-shirted environmentalist, I’m not anti-nuclear, I’m not even anti-fossil fuels – but I do believe in the reality of global warming"