Regular price €18.50
a Resident Music book of the year 2024
A01=Jennifer Lucy Allan
anthropology
anthropology books
architecture
art
arts and crafts books
Author_Jennifer Lucy Allan
Category=DNC
Category=NHTB
Category=WFN
Clay
culture
Enchantment
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eq_biography-true-stories
eq_crafts-hobbies
eq_history
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eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
history
history books
history books for adults
human history
James Fox
Jennifer Lucy Allan
Kassia St Clair
Katherine May
Lara Maiklem
mudlarking
pottery and making
pottery books for adults
sociology
The Foghorn's Lament
The Golden Thread
The Secret Lives of Colour
The World According to Colour
Theads of Life Clare Hunter
Wintering

Product details

  • ISBN 9781399607650
  • Weight: 220g
  • Dimensions: 128 x 196mm
  • Publication Date: 12 Jun 2025
  • Publisher: Orion Publishing Co
  • Publication City/Country: GB
  • Product Form: Paperback
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'An engrossing history of the deep connection between humans and clay' KATHERINE MAY, author of Enchantment

'Fascinating and powerful' BRIAN ENO


Clay is baked into our culture: we have been taking handfuls of earth and forming them into their own image since our history began. In Clay: A Human History, Jennifer Lucy Allan navigates the story of humankind and our relationship to making and creativity through our relationship with this enigmatic, ancient material.

Born out of a desire to know and understand the spiritual and practical applications of clay in both its micro and macro histories, Clay: A Human History is a hybrid of archaeology, history and lived experience as an amateur potter.

'I have loved learning from every chapter in this beautiful and affecting book' VASHTI BUNYAN

Jennifer Lucy Allan is an author, journalist and broadcaster with a PhD in foghorns. Her first book, The Foghorn's Lament, was published in May 2021. She is a presenter on BBC Radio 3's long running music show, Late Junction, and presented Life, Death and the Foghorn, and Oh Yoko! for BBC Radio 4. As a journalist she has written on underground and experimental music for over 15 years, and also co-ran the record labels Arc Light Editions and Good Energy.