James Rebanks, shepherd and writer
Desert Island Discs
BBC
4.3 • 14.3K Ratings
🗓️ 20 January 2019
⏱️ 50 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
James Rebanks is a shepherd and the best-selling author of The Shepherd’s Life.
Born in Cumbria in 1974, he grew up venerating his grandfather, who taught him what he needed to know in order to take over the family farm from his father one day. He found school an irksome distraction, and left aged 15 with two GCSEs. It wasn’t until his early 20s, after he’d developed an interest in reading and had met his future wife Helen, that he decided to return to study at a local college in the evenings. Encouraged by a tutor, he applied for a place at Oxford University, and graduated with a double first in History. After university, he worked in a number of white-collar jobs, in order to boost his income while ensuring he could continue to work on the farm.
He breeds two different types of sheep: Herdwicks, which are a native breed to his part of the world, and Swaledales, which he kept out of respect to his father who died in 2015, just before the publication of James’s first book. He began chronicling his life as a shepherd on Twitter in 2012 but is currently taking a break from tweeting. He and Helen have four children.
BOOK CHOICE: The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway LUXURY: Pen and Paper CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: A New England by Kirsty MacColl
Presenter: Lauren Laverne Producer: Cathy Drysdale
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hey, it's Doleepa, and I'm at your service. |
| 0:04.7 | Join me as I serve up personal conversations with my sensational guests. |
| 0:08.8 | Do a leap interviews, Tim Cook. |
| 0:11.2 | Technology doesn't want to be good or bad. |
| 0:15.0 | It's in the hands of the creator. |
| 0:16.7 | It's not every day that I have the CEO of the world's biggest company in my living room. |
| 0:20.7 | If you're looking at your phone more than you're looking in someone's eyes, you're doing the wrong thing. |
| 0:26.0 | Julie, at your service, listen to all episodes on BBC Sales. BBC Sounds, music radio podcasts. |
| 0:35.8 | I'm Laura Levern and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast. |
| 0:39.4 | Every week I ask my guest to choose the Eight Tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take with them |
| 0:44.8 | if they were cast away to a desert island. This is an extended version of the original radio |
| 0:49.8 | for broadcast and for rights reasons the music is shorter than the original broadcast. |
| 0:55.6 | I hope you enjoy listening. The My castaway today is the shepherd and writer James Rebanks. His family have been farming in the Cumbrian Fells for over 600 years and he's firmly rooted in the land. |
| 1:27.0 | His skills and knowledge have been passed down through the generations and the farming life began early for him. |
| 1:33.0 | As a toddler he rode on the back of his grandfather's tractor |
| 1:36.0 | and as he grew he'd increasingly help out with the daily tasks of clipping, dipping, feeding and mucking out. |
| 1:42.0 | His other career as a best-selling author was inspired by his discovery |
| 1:46.0 | of social media. tweeting pictures of his beloved Herdwick sheep and his sheepdogs brought |
| 1:51.0 | him to the attention of publishers. The Shepherd's life was a huge |
| 1:54.5 | success and brought the reality of life on the hills to townies across the world. |
| 1:59.4 | He says, I have always liked the feeling of carrying on something bigger than me, |
| 2:03.4 | something that stretches back through other hands and other eyes into the depths of time. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.