Winner of the Apollo Book of the Year Award 2024

Drawing is at the heart of human creativity. The most democratic form of art-making, it requires nothing more than a plain surface and a stub of pencil, a piece of chalk or an inky brush. Our prehistoric ancestors drew with natural pigments on the walls of caves, and every subsequent culture has practised drawing--whether on papyrus, parchment, or paper. Artists throughout history have used drawing as part of the creative process.

While painting and sculpture have been shaped heavily by money and influence, drawing has always offered extraordinary creative latitude. Here we see the artist at his or her most unguarded. Susan Owens offers a glimpse over artists' shoulders--from Michelangelo, Rembrandt, and Hokusai to Van Gogh, Käthe Kollwitz, and Yayoi Kusama--as they work, think, and innovate, as they scrutinise the world around them or escape into imagination.

The Story of Drawing loops around the established history of art, sometimes staying close, at other times diving into exhilarating and altogether less familiar territory.

England has long built its sense of self on its past. What does it mean for Geoffrey of Monmouth to call forth King Arthur from the post-Roman fog, for William Morris to resurrect the skills of the medieval workshop, and Julia Margaret Cameron to portray the Arthurian court using her Victorian camera?

Told through the distinctive imaginings of successive generations, this book considers how and why national myths have come into being, the multitude of forms they have taken, and what centuries of looking back might mean for the present and future. More than three hundred voices are featured from over thirteen centuries, from Beowulf, Walter Scott, and Queen Victoria to Pauline Boty and Lubaina Himid.

Not a history of England, but a history of those who have written, drawn, and dreamed it into being, Imagining England's Past offers a lively, erudite account of the creation and narration of the English past.

English landscape painting is often said to be an eighteenth-century invention, yet when we look for representations of the countryside in British art and literature, we find a story that begins with Old English poetry and winds its way through history, all the way up to the present day.

In Spirit of Place, Susan Owens illuminates how the British landscape has been framed, reimagined, and reshaped by generations of creative thinkers. To offer a panoramic view of the countryside throughout history, Owens dives into the work of writers and artists from Bede and the Gawain Poet to Thomas Gainsborough, Jane Austen, J. M. W. Turner, and John Constable, and from Paul Nash and Barbara Hepworth to Robert Macfarlane. Richly illustrated, including manuscript pages, early maps, paintings, film stills, and photographs, Spirit of Place is a compelling narrative of how we have been shown the British landscape.

The first edition of this seminal book was written at a time of rapidly growing interest in the potential for land use planning to deliver sustainable development, and explored the connections between the two and implications for public policy. In the decade since the book was first conceived, environmental imperatives have risen still further up the policial agenda and land use conflicts have intensified, lending even greater importance to the authors' research.

In a rigorous discussion of concepts, policy instruments and contemporary planning dilemmas, the authors challenge prevailing assumptions about planning for sustainability. After charting the remarkable growth in expectations of planning, they show how attempts to interpret sustainability must lead to fundamental moral and political choices.

Will Moon Daisy finally get to the bottom of her nightmares and find the one who is responsible?

Abigail's death leaves a trail of destruction. Desmond seeks reveng, as the Price family places blame.

This beautiful book reveals works from the Victoria and Albert Museum's rich collection of drawings ranging from the early 17th century right up to the present day. Reproducing, often for the first time, works by foremost British artists, this book offers fresh insights into the wide range of ways in which these artists have used drawing to think on paper, build up ideas, and make finished exhibition pieces. Including examples from the greatest masters--William Blake, Thomas Rowlandson, John Constable, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Edward Burne-Jones, Paul Nash, Lucian Freud, David Hockney, John Piper, Grayson Perry, and others--author Susan Owens discusses the art and craft of drawing, materials, and techniques, and why artists chose them.

A collection of poetry. The short poetry is from the desk of Susan Owens.

When Moon goes missing, the whole town is in an uproar, pointing fingers at each other. Who is to blame? Is it the stranded soldier she gave a ride to days before her disappearance? Was she in the wrong place at the wrong time, snatched by a stranger? Or was it one of her neighbors?

High school is not easy, and don't Sarah know it. After moving back to her father's home town, Sarah finds that things are not as they seem. What do a centuries old curse and a silly ring have in common? Sarah soon will find out.

The first edition of this seminal book was written at a time of rapidly growing interest in the potential for land use planning to deliver sustainable development, and explored the connections between the two and implications for public policy. In the decade since the book was first conceived, environmental imperatives have risen still further up the policial agenda and land use conflicts have intensified, lending even greater importance to the authors' research.

In a rigorous discussion of concepts, policy instruments and contemporary planning dilemmas, the authors challenge prevailing assumptions about planning for sustainability. After charting the remarkable growth in expectations of planning, they show how attempts to interpret sustainability must lead to fundamental moral and political choices.