Trees in literature

One thing that helped improve my overall appreciation of literature better was learning how to distinguish trees: oaks, beeches, ash, birch, cypresses, hawthorn, rowan.

For example, look at book five of the Odyssey, at Calypso's cavern; a picturesque location of juniper, alder, and poplar trees. After looking at a couple of charts, and learning how to identify these trees while hiking, I feel like I have a better grasp on such scenes, as well as others in literature. Tolstoy and Chekhov, for example, are fond of depicting scenery with specific trees and shrubs.

So I recommend tree spotting as a literary hobby, and something to do while walking outdoors or along park land. It's surprisingly fun to do. The best way is to look at the leaves and bark; the seven lobed broad leaf of the oak, the twinned little opposing leaves of the ash, the white bark and small triangular leaves of the silver birch. Each tree will often have a specific folklore which might offer a deeper reading of an author's work, or provide you with inspiration in your own creative work; knowing the juniper's logs have a fragrant incense-like fragrance when burned, the rowan's traditional use as a ward against witches, the birch as a wayfarers friend due to its drinkable sap and pioneering nature.

What are /lits favourite trees, and poetry and literature featuring trees?

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en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_That_Owns_Itself
twitter.com/AnonBabble

Jesus christ, this board is so far up it's own ass

t. doesn't own a tree

good post

You should read Goethe's Metamorphosis of Plants

I know, but he has a point.

10/10 will start doing this
Walden

OP's post might be pretentious, but it offers meaning. What does yours offer?

>tfw used to go tree-spotting and flower-collecting in the woods nearby with my gf
>tfw she left me and a year later she's dating my sister and they're on holiday in Italy and probably fucking like rabbits
I wish a tree would fall on me.

>check out some German books on European trees
>glossary
>common word for hybrid is "Bastard"
I fucking love German.

The point about the folklore behind trees is pretty good. They're a common literary device like OP said and if a tree is called out on purpose there's probably something behind it.

Damn, dude. I once met a guy who actually knew all this stuff. We literally talked hours about the lore of the oak and the meaning of trees in general in pre-Roman Germanic culture.

Good times.

>"Trees in literature"
>chart of leaves
Good start but seeing whole trees as well would be better

I agree. I hope OPs YA fiction series with tree-witches and it's eventual teen movie adaptation are very successful.

What did he read?

If it's something I'd let my kids read/watch, I'm all for it.

(At least it's not based on erotic fanfiction.)

There are a lot of charts and guides out there, but when you're walking along a copse or in a wood, the shape is lost, but the leaves and bark and fruits are visible. That's why I suggest leaves are a good place to start. It's better to find one with specific native/common trees for your continent.

I have no fucking clue.
It was this German musician, who was obsessed with old instruments (played the harp like a nymph) and was generally a bit out there.
But when we went on walks, he'd teach you all about the local flora and fauna.
Like "if you see this beetle, you know that a linden tree isn't far off" or how incredibly useful birch is for making fires.

Man, I miss that guy. He was like out of a book.

>it's
>it is

Weird fucking post, man

If I wrote anything at the moment it'd be a pastiche low fantasy or weird tale along Lovecraftian lines; thickly canopied forests of beech where lichen-encrusted tombs lie, and where abominations roam the gnarled boles at midnight under a gibbous moon, etc. Well, I'm not a Gene Wolfe or Tolkein.

Write the Mistborn but with trees user, it'll sell.

tfw don't own a tree

Hakuin is bae.

who else /audubon/ here?

>mfw I started studying birds and not trees

t. isn't a stirnerian-egoist tree that owns itself
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_That_Owns_Itself

never gonna make it

Top 3 bird books - go!

Somebody else can run with that idea, I'm more familiar with Brandon Sanderson's youtube lectures than his books.

That's neat. An oak tree, King of the native English forest - Beech being the queen. Pic related is the cherry variety often seen in English rural villages and suburbia.

>cherry beech
'copper' beech

GOAT
Anyone who says otherwise is a liar and a faggot

Nothing wrong with talking about trees m8

Maybe she's doing a herbarium of your family.

Bumping with a chart. Of these common European and British trees, the Ash may eventually become extinct due to a fungus.

Ashes ashes they all fall down

What kind of scumbag would betray their own sibling like that?

Did this with my parents and sister in Spades along with bird- and sky watching throughout my childhood. Great help for literary studies.
>student walks into Nabokov's office during office hours at Cornell, I believe
>sits down, says he wants to be a writer
>Nabokov looks at him, then looks out the window
>student also looks out the window
>Nabokov points at a tree, what kind of tree is that?
>i don't know, sir..
>you will never be a writer--
An absolutely great book on the subject if you live in the states is A Natural History of Trees of Eastern and Central North America by Donald Culross Peattie. He also wrote a volume concerning western trees. These books are classics.

You mean because he actually reads, enjoys those works, and is capable of interrelating meaning?

No, you're the one with a tree limb up your ass.