Coats off, gumboots and wellies on…
Ion Trewin on planting a Man Booker oak avenue
Ion Trewin is Literary Director of the Man Booker Prizes
"We do look happy, don't we? Coats off, gumboots and wellies on: all very different from reading books. The Woodland Trust team had dug us the basic holes in the yellow clay Essex soil, but we soon learnt that there's more to planting a tree.
We had thirteen oak saplings in pots to symbolise the Booker Dozen, the 2008 longlist. As well as Michael Portillo, who chaired last year's panel, we had his fellow judges, Louise Doughty and Alex Clark, wielding their spades. Sadly Hardeep Singh Kohli had to cancel at the last moment thanks to a BBC One Show commitment, and James Heneage was out of the country. But the digging team was augmented by two of our administrative team from Colman Getty, Dotti Irving, the chief executive, and her colleague Lucy Chavasse. Nor was I as literary director of the Man Booker prizes going to be left out.
The planting came about after Portillo and his team decided they would like to replenish some of the trees cut down to produce the tons of paper needed to print the Man Booker submissions. A hundred and twelve novels were entered last year, and it seemed only fitting to give something back. .
This new fifty-acre woodland at the appropriately named Theydon Bois runs alongside the M11. Many thousand trees have already been planted. The Man Booker grove now curves gently down the hillside, each tree properly staked and with a mulch of woodchip to prevent weeds establishing themselves. With some rain over the next three months we were told that the trees should bed in nicely. By next year they should be putting out fresh shoots. Close by a handsome old oak estimated at 200 years old demonstrated to the Man Booker team that we were planting for the long term.
I hope we will make this an annual event. Next year perhaps at the Woodland Trust's new forest site near St Albans."
