The Biodynamic Movement in Britain

This highly informative book gives a history of the first hundred years of the UK biodynamic movement by an expert in the field. Readers may recall from Marina O'Connell's book on regenerative food systems that Steiner's agricultural course given in Poland in 1924 effectively launched the modern organic movement. This was supported by Count von Keyserlinck who owned a large farming estate, and had become concerned about the decline in seed vitality, livestock health and food quality in an era preceding large-scale chemical agriculture. Intrinsic vitality and health play a key role, and the farm or garden is regarded as an organism to be treated in a spirit of mutuality rather than maximum extraction. Farmers themselves are encouraged to develop their intuitive faculties or 'knowing eye' and to recognise 'the totality of life and its interconnected relationship to the living forces of the cosmos.' (p. 22) The course led to the establishment of experimental circles, with many of the pioneers featured in the narrative.

Astronomical calendars were already being produced in the late 1930s with recommendations for planting and harvest in relation to changing cosmic configurations. These practitioners developed a new science of life based on humans as spiritual beings. In the UK, Lord Northbourne, Sir Albert Howard and Lady Eve Balfour were significant figures in the organic movement more generally, and Northbourne wrote that 'those who handle the soil must look upon it and treat it as a living whole, for it is a living thing.' A special chapter is devoted to the remarkable work of Ehrenfried Pfeiffer, especially on sensitive crystallisation. The book also covers the relationship of biodynamic farming to the Camphill movement - its founder Karl Koenig composed some profound inner meditations on natural cycles. In my view, the current crisis in agriculture demands a return to fundamental regenerative principles that work in harmony with Nature and promote the interconnected nature of health that starts with the soil and requires active human engagement: 'Biodynamic food and a real-life connection to nature, the earth and the spiritual world will become ever more important as we face the dehumanising tendencies of materialism that confront us today.' (p. 145) Indeed!