Merlin Sheldrake - Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures

A delightfully granular debutFrom bread to booze to the very fiber of life, the world turns on fungus, and [Merlin] Sheldrake provides a top-notch portrait.

Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

A revelatory look at fungi that proves their relevance to humans goes far beyond their uses in cooking[Entangled Life is] a thoroughly enjoyable paean to a wholly different kingdom of life.

Publishers Weekly

Entangled Life is a triumph and a thing of vast beauty.

T OM H ODGKINSON , author of The Idler

I was completely unprepared for Sheldrakes book. It rolled over me like a tsunami, leaving the landscape rearranged but all the more beautiful.

N ICHOLAS H UMPHREY , emeritus professor of psychology at the London School of Economics, author of Soul Dust

Entangled Life is a revelation. It is a radical, hopeful, and important book and I couldnt put it down. With elegance, wit, and clarity, Sheldrake engages us in the hidden world of fungi, a miraculous web of connections, interactions, and communication that changes the way we need to look at life, the planet, and ourselves.

I SABELLA T REE , author of Wilding

Sheldrake awakens the reader to a shape-shifting, mind-altering, animate world that not only surrounds us but intimately involves us as well. A joyful exploration of the most overlooked and enigmatic kingdom of life, and one that expanded my appreciation of what it means to be alive.

P ETER B RANNEN , author of The Ends of the World

It is impossible to put this book down. Entangled Life provides a window into the mind-boggling biology and fascinating cultures surrounding fungal life. Much like a mycelial network, the books tendrils extend into the deepest reaches of fungis incredible properties, their histories, as well as their innumerable uses in materials, medicine, and ecology. Sheldrake asks us to consider a life-form that is radically alien to ours, yet vibrant and lively underfoot.

H ANS U LRICH O BRIST , author of Ways of Curating

Entangled Life is an adventurous and indeed daring book, opening several unfamiliar micro-domains in the organic life world and its multiple connections. There is much to be learned in this wide field, and this vivid, scrupulous guide points the way!

J . H . P RYNNE

Unputdownable, this extraordinary work explores the awesome range of activities of fungi: enabling the first life on land; interacting in countless ways with other life-forms; shaping human history and potentially safeguarding our future. At once rigorously scientific and boldly imaginative, Entangled Life raises fundamental questions about the many natures of life on Earth.

N ICK J ARDINE , emeritus professor of history and philosophy of science, University of Cambridge

Entangled Life is a remarkable piece of work from Merlin Sheldrake that manages to be at once scholarly and visionary and yet remains a deeply engaging and enjoyable read. This book provides a new and penetrating analysis of the fungal kingdom of life that will be a greatly enriching read for all students of the living world.

D R. I AN H ENDERSON , lecturer in plant sciences, University of Cambridge

In his remarkable first book, Sheldrake takes us on a host of profoundly eye-opening journeys into the astonishing world of fungi. After reading Sheldrakes masterpiece, I am more convinced than ever that we will never solve the grave problems of our times unless we deeply re-entangle our lives fungus-style into the living fabric of our lustrous planet.

D R. S TEPHAN H ARDING , senior lecturer in holistic science and deep ecology, Schumacher College

Fungi are fascinating! Elegant life strategies meet with delicate omnipresence, driving global ecosystems. Sheldrakes book informs and offers new concepts. Looking through Sheldrakes lens, fungal biology integrates with art, philosophy, and human society. His voice is real and personal. His book educates and entertains.

U TA P ASZKOWSKI , professor of plant molecular genetics, University of Cambridge

I LOOKED UP TOWARD the top of the tree. Ferns and orchids sprouted from its trunk, which vanished into a tangle of lianas in the canopy. High above me, a toucan flapped off its perch with a croak, and a troupe of howler monkeys worked themselves into a slow roar. The rain had only just stopped, and the leaves above me shed heavy drops of water in sudden showers. A low mist hung over the ground.

The trees roots wound outward from the base of its trunk, soon vanishing into the thick drifts of fallen leaves that covered the floor of the jungle. I used a stick to tap the ground for snakes. A tarantula scuttled off, and I knelt, feeling my way down the trees trunk and along one of its roots into a mass of spongy debris where the finer roots matted into a thick red and brown tangle. A rich smell drifted upward. Termites clambered through the labyrinth, and a millipede coiled up, playing dead. My root vanished into the ground, and with a trowel I cleared the area around the spot. I used my hands and a spoon to loosen the top layer of earth and dug as gently as I could, slowly uncovering it as it ranged out from the tree and twisted along just below the surface of the soil.

After an hour, I had traveled about a meter. My root was now thinner than string and had started to proliferate wildly. It was hard to keep track of as it knotted with its neighbors, so I lay down on my stomach and lowered my face into the shallow trench I had made. Some roots smell sharp and nutty and others woody and bitter, but the roots of my tree had a spicy resinous kick when I scratched them with a fingernail. For several hours I inched along the ground, scratching and sniffing every few centimeters to make sure I hadnt lost the thread.

As the day went on, more filaments sprang out from the root Id uncovered and I chose a few of them to follow all the way to the tips, where they burrowed into fragments of rotting leaf or twig. I dipped the ends in a vial of water to wash off the mud and looked at them through a loupe. The rootlets branched like a small tree and their surface was covered with a filmy layer that appeared fresh and sticky. It was these delicate structures I wanted to examine. From these roots, a fungal network laced out into the soil and around the roots of nearby trees. Without this fungal web my tree would not exist. Without similar fungal webs no plant would exist anywhere. All life on land, including my own, depended on these networks. I tugged lightly on my root and felt the ground move.

There are moments in moist love when heaven is jealous of what we on earth can do.