What is Writing Home?

A series of letters and essays, a structure for the questions I find myself carrying, maybe even a hearth around which we can gather.

I’m Dougald Hine, a social thinker, writer and speaker who bears at least partial responsibility for the creation of a series of organisations including the Dark Mountain Project and a school called HOME. I also present a podcast called The Great Humbling with the ‘recovering sustainability consultant’ Ed Gillespie.

My book, At Work in the Ruins: Finding Our Place in the Time of Science, Climate Change, Pandemics and All the Other Emergencies is coming out in February 2023 with Chelsea Green.

I grew up in the northeast of England, spent my twenties travelling and working as a radio journalist in Sheffield, then moved to London for a while, until I was rescued by a Swedish woman I met at a festival in the middle of a forest. We settled in a small town, north of Uppsala, where people mostly know me as Alfie’s dad.

Here on Substack, I’m telling stories and puzzling through the strangeness of the times in which we find ourselves, asking myself how the beliefs I once held are bearing up in a world where the old maps no longer make sense.

I’ll have more to say here as the series gets underway, but meanwhile, you can subscribe to receive my words in your inbox – and take out a paying subscription to support my work and engage with others who are drawn to these questions.