The Office of Public Lectures presents: Is A River Alive? Exploring the lives, deaths and rights of rivers with Robert Macfarlane

May 27, 2026 6:30 pm

Town Hall Seattle, Livestream (Hybrid)

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Headshot of Robert Macfarlane Robert Macfarlane

Across the globe, rivers are dying—choked by pollution, parched by drought, and shackled by dams. The prevailing narrative treats freshwater as a mere resource, water as a liquid asset, existing solely for human use. This lecture offers a different current: an ancient and urgent story in which rivers live, die, and even possess rights. It reimagines rivers as vital, sentient life-forces, intertwined with our own survival. 

Spanning Ecuador, India, Aotearoa New Zealand, northeastern Canada, and the speaker’s native southern England, the talk weaves together the voices of activists, artists, and lawmakers. Passionate and immersive, it promises to spark debate, shift perspectives, and invite listeners to recognize a profound truth: our fate has always flowed with the rivers. 

Registration opens March 10, 2026.

About the speaker

Robert Macfarlane

Author 

Robert Macfarlane is an internationally acclaimed writer whose work explores nature, people, and place. His bestselling books—Underland, Landmarks, The Old Ways, The Wild Places, and Mountains of the Mind—have been translated into more than thirty languages, earning numerous global awards and widespread adaptation across film, music, theatre, radio, and dance. He also penned the book-length prose poem Ness and has written operas, plays, and films, including River and Mountain, both narrated by Willem Dafoe. 

Macfarlane has collaborated closely with artists such as Olafur Eliasson and Stanley Donwood. With Jackie Morris, he co-created the internationally bestselling nature-poetry and art books The Lost Words and The Lost Spells. His latest work, Is a River Alive?, was published in May 2025. 

Beyond literature, he is a lyricist and performer, having written albums and songs with musicians including Cosmo Sheldrake, Julie Fowlis, and Johnny Flynn—releasing two albums, Lost in the Cedar Wood and The Moon Also Rises. In 2017, he received the E.M. Forster Prize for Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and in 2023, he became the inaugural recipient of the Weston International Award for nonfiction. Macfarlane is a Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge.

Event Accessibility

The University is committed to providing access, equal opportunity, and reasonable accommodation in its services, programs, activities, education, and employment for individuals with disabilities. To request disability accommodations, contact the UW Disability Services Office at least 10 days in advance at 206-543-6450 (voice), 206-543-6452 (TTY), 206-685-7264 (fax), or dso@uw.edu.