A foraged passion

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This article was published 13/07/2024 (747 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Mushrooms and all things fungal have exploded in popularity of late. Keith Seifert’s The Hidden Kingdom of Fungi and Diane Borsato’s Mushrooming have been featured in these very pages, while Merlin Sheldrake’s 2020 book Entangled Life also offers a beautiful entrance into this oft-misunderstood and underappreciated kingdom.

Winnipeg’s Ariel Gordon, a poet, editor (including copy editor at the Free Press) and essayist, is no latecomer to the party. More than 20 years of experience hunting, photographing and writing on mushrooms culminates in Fungal, her wide-ranging set of essays. Varying in form, topic and theme, Fungal’s Manitoba-centric focus is a satisfying and often invigorating read.

There is something uncanny about fungus. It sustains us inside and out yet can appear alien, even frightening. We’re surrounded by it, even if we remain oblivious to its presence, absent very deliberate investigation. Mushrooms can be prized and deadly, surprising and banal.

Fungal mines this elusiveness, both about mushrooms and not. Through a dozen essays, Gordon’s newest book moves deftly from mudlarking to popular culture to regional exploration, without ever quite forgetting our collective interconnection with the fungal kingdom.

Cultivator is a fantastic piece that capably highlights Gordon’s dexterous movement among seemingly disparate topics. She journals at-home mushroom cultivation, a burgeoning hobby among the do-it-yourself crew, while exploring television’s Hannibal and The Last of Us and the growing interest in fungal burials. In this way, without being too pointed, Gordon draws out our own ambivalences, as we both consume and fear the fungal world.

Eating My Words details a wonderfully quirky attempt to cultivate mushrooms on a copy of her earlier essay collection, Treed. Here we find also something like a statement of ethos on a life lived within nature, worthy of cultivation and protection, yet situated in human structures that appear equally destructive and inescapable.

We’re also treated to examinations — indeed, they populate every piece here — of the importance of social connection, of bonds of friendship and family and of mutual responsibility.

Not every essay comes to fruition equally well. In the Kitschen takes a novel, entertaining idea — the author’s reluctant and rapidly growing collection of fungal tchotchkes — but relies a bit too heavily on her social media experiences. Gordon’s account of working at a mushroom farm, despite the apt criticisms it levels, flirts with proletariat tourism, yet remains an interesting read. The titular essay is a lovely paean to University of Manitoba professor and scientist David Punter.

It’s difficult to read Fungal apart from one’s own experience as a Manitoban. This is a work thoroughly located in both time and place; familiar parks, streams and streets abound. It wouldn’t be surprising to find the name of at least one person you know here.

Yet this geographical rootedness is less by intention than happenstance. Originally planned as an exploration of mushrooms and nature across Canada, Fungal was forced to localize during the pandemic. The focus on Manitoba is a rare COVID-19 silver lining.

Gordon’s enthusiasm is infectious, and her ability to work across diverse topics admirable. The poems included here feel natural and fitting, not impositions. Her writing is perceptive and funny and thoughtful.

Reading Fungal, it becomes easier and more interesting to pay more attention to the outer world and less to the inner. This transmission of the appreciation for nature from author to reader is a particularly high compliment to Gordon’s work.

Jarett Myskiw is a teacher in Winnipeg.