Background information

In his autobiography The Shepherd’s Life: A Tale of the Lake District, James Rebanks intends to show what life in the Lake District really is like. 

The Lake District is a mountainous region in North West England. It is located in Cumbria, which is a county in North West England. The region is well-known for its lakes, forests, and hills, which make it a unique location. It also contains the deepest and largest natural lakes in England – including Windermere, which is England's largest natural freshwater lake. 

The Lake District is a tourist attraction and welcomes millions of tourists every year. The Lake District has become known to readers and tourists through the works of the poet William Wordsworth (1770-1850), which describe a romanticized version of the place. One of Wordsworth’s most famous poems about the Lake District is I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud, which highlights his love for nature. 

In his preface for The Shepherd’s Life: A Tale of the Lake District, Rebanks talks about cultural imperialism, which means imposing a dominant community’s values on another community. Rebanks explains that this is the case of the Lake District, where farmers struggle to work the land and make a living, while tourists have little concern for the well-being of locals, but focus on their own idealized version of the place. ...