Diary of a Young Naturalist, by Dara Mcanulty

Diary of a Young Naturalist By Dara Mcanulty Little Toller £16

Dara Mcanulty is a teenage lad from Northern Ireland who has become a leading light among young environmental activists. Over the last few years, he’s built up a large following on social media, and the passion of his writing, broadcasting and public speaking has been championed by Chris Packham and Robert Macfarlane.

This book is a diary of a year in his life (it doesn’t explicitly say which year but, from the events described, it sounds like 2018-19), during which his family moves from County Fermanagh to County Down, he changes school, and his public profile expands – he finds himself both addressing marches on Downing Street and hobnobbing with the Prime Ministerial team.

It is an emotional rollercoaster, because Mcanulty is young and autistic, and his conviction and confidence are shadowed by an inner life that oscillates between ecstatic encounters with the natural world and an excruciating loneliness magnified by social contact.

With nature, he can just be; with humans, he is ‘always looking for nuances, facial expressions, intonation’, as he struggles to decode relationships. The only people he is wholly comfortable with are his family, who with the exception of his father are also autistic.

The timeline of the book is adorned with richly detailed descriptions of the seasonally changing landscape and natural world around Enniskillen and the Mourne Mountains near Castlewellan.

Mcanulty is especially happy describing birds – he won the RSPB medal for conservation – and has the knack of catching a moment amid the flurry of wings. He describes a fulmar ‘like the Buddha in a trance’; a ‘monochrome mutiny’ among razorbills; puffins ‘like sleepwalkers’; and a goshawk chick like ‘an autumn forest rolled in the first snows of winter’. He seems to feel a

particular affinity with the hen harrier, ‘a talisman of delight, giver of silvery inner light’.

But the seasonal and geographical journey is accompanied by a thumping heart. Standing ‘in an extraordinary and beautiful place’, he feels a ‘terrible angst rising in my chest’. Melancholy and ‘heart-racing anxiety’ are never far away: even as he describes a spring evening with a sedge warbler in ‘dappled and sepia light’ that makes his ‘insides explode, words ricochet inside out’.

Fame does its fickle thing: ‘Wellmeaning people tell me how inspirational I am. How my tweets lift their day. How my blogs, campaigning, talks are “just amazing” or “fabulous” … I hate it. Honestly, I feel like an imposter.’

But it’s more complex than that – and he is more honest. After filming with Chris Packham, he is painfully aware of the criticism as well as the praise on social media and recognises that he seeks ‘attention and validation’.

This is a densely emotional, deeply affecting book which sometimes feels crowded with detail and abrupt changes of mood. Mcanulty writes revealingly that at the point of an encounter, he scarcely notices what he feels. He absorbs detail: ‘I only know I’ve experienced it when I’m writing it all down later. The intensity gushes out and I feel everything again.’ Here, writing is the reverse of experience recollected with tranquillity. It’s the point at which the author actually has the encounter. It is not necessarily framed for the reader.

During the year, things do change for the better and a welcome ease emerges. He was dreadfully bullied in his old school and expects more of the same when they move. It doesn’t happen, and there’s even a neighbouring boy with whom he looks at beetles. The single happiest moment seems to be when he is showing his sister’s young friends the plumage of a goldfinch – when, as a teacher, he rediscovers an instinctive love and feels a simple ‘glow’.

What will become of a special talent like Mcanulty’s? How will he be mentored? He is so emotionally connected to the natural world that its degradation feels like a personal wound, and that intensity is a useful advocacy tool.

But we should fear the X-men syndrome; it’s convenient to think that the insight and passion of neurodivergent young people like Mcanulty or Greta Thunberg will save us, but they have no superpowers. We all own this mess.

As Mcanulty’s account shows, it is enough sometimes for him to get through another day, let alone a year.