The Televising of the English Landscape: W. G. Hoskins

The 1972 BBC Horizon programme, The Making of the English Landscape, is based on the work of the eminent scholar, W. G. Hoskins. Hoskins's book of that name, first published in 1955, is acknowledged as a pioneering study of the historical evolution of the English landscape. The Horizon programme is the first foray into the filming of Hoskins's ideas and was followed by two well-received series, Landscapes of England (1976, 1978). Hoskins's view is a long one, and his emphasis throughout these programmes is that ‘everything is older than we think’, but that ‘Nature is always waiting to take over again when man abandons his handiwork’. Hoskins as presenter has his own evocations of the past, but, watched 40 years later, the programmes themselves testify to both ways of making television programmes, and landscapes of England, long gone. This article returns to these programmes to ask why and how Hoskins might be of interest in the twenty-first century at a time when there has been an expansion of landscape programming and nature writing and the countryside has become the site of controversy. Using material from the BBC Written Archives, the article analyses to programmes through their mobilisation of expertise, their presentation of landscape and their use of television form. It concludes with broader reflections on the place of Hoskins's arguments and tone in a time of climate crisis.