Ian Grosz talks with author and poet Karen Lloyd about microplastics and pollution in the UK’s Lake District National Park, about the Rights of Nature and how we might protect it. 

Karen outlines her connection to Paperboats Writers, her views on the role of the writer in a climate and ecological crisis, and reads from her essay ‘Inside the Rockpool Shrimp there is a Dying Star’, first published on Dark Mountain in 2022 and featuring in the Anthology of Speculative Nature edited by Jos Smith and Harry Saunders at the University of East Anglia. Karen also talks about the pressures of tourism on the Lake District’s habitats, the solutions found in Europe to protect vulnerable ecosystems from human disturbance, and how we might approach that in the predominantly cultural landscapes of the UK.

If you’re concerned about climate change, want to delve further into the issues surrounding it, and like great writing, follow and subscribe to the Paperboats Podcast to hear from a host of fantastic nature writers.