The surge in wild swimming shows we are looking for something we've lost | Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett

It has become a social media cliche, but taking the plunge in lakes and the sea offers healing and the chance to reconnect with natureThe romantic poets - Coleridge, Byron, Keats - loved to swim. Swimming in open water offered the opportunity to connect with nature, nourish creativity, garner spiritual inspiration and experience the sublime. Their obsession was called hydromania, and it's back. "Wild swimming", as it is now known, is growing in popularity across the UK. It is increasingly featured in the press and on social media, often coupled with intensely romantic language. In publishing, memoirs about swimming and its ability to heal addiction and mental health problems have become their own niche genre. Related: 'I launch naked into the unknown': writers on the joy of wild swimming Continue reading...