I’ve recently read Eric’s essay ‘Psychogeography: Introducing the Zone and the March-Riever’ (available here – the pdf link is in the first paragraph) and having traded a few emails with Eric earlier this week I thought I’d offer up a brief summary of Eric’s standpoint, its innovations and a slight niggle I have on one aspect of his formulation of a ‘new’ form of psychogeographer, the ‘March-Riever’.

Eric’s essay is well worth a read. It is a very thoughtful, well grounded (both in the literature and embodied experience) exploration of a route towards a psychogeography that is less fixated on excavating a “storied metropolis” (3) (in other words excavating some hidden history), more appreciative of the redemptive qualities of the present (i.e. less nostalgic) and more celebrative of the resurgent power of nature.

Eric helpfully situates the roots of a recreational contemporary psychogeography (one perhaps expressed by many of the contributors…