The Outermost House: A Year of Life On The Great Beach of Cape Cod Review

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(More customer reviews)The Outermost House is a classic, not just of natural history literature, but of American literature. If you love the outdoors, or the sea, or prose that flows like poetry, you should keep this small book always nearby. The harried introvert will especially appreciate it: reading even a page or two will transport you to a quiet place where the wind through the dune grass is the only sound that strikes your ear.
In addition to being a great writer, Beston is an acute observer biological phenomena, and not a bad theorist either. His discourse on the relationship other animals bear to us ("They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations...") does more to unlink the Great Chain of Being than any philosophical essay. And Beston's influence has been wide-ranging, not only among natural history writers, but among writers in general: unless I am mistaken, The Outermost House is one of the sources for the "Dry Salvages" section of T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets. (If no one else has noticed that before, I want coauthorship on the paper!)
Some books are so memorable that parts of them become internalized on first reading. The first time I read The Outermost House, its final sentence -- as graceful an example of polysyndeton as you will find in English -- became mine. Now, I pass it on to you: "For the gifts of life are the earth's, and they are given to all, and they are the songs of birds at daybreak, Orion and the Bear, and dawn seen over ocean from the beach."

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Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast Review

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(More customer reviews)"Postcards from Ed" reveal an Edward Abbey that was complex -- provocative and humorous. The letters are well chosen to show Abbey's warmth towards family, anger toward establishment and delight in friendship. More than anything, Abbey's letters create a picture of a man without pretense. Secondhand clothes, trailer-living, rundown trucks and cheap beer were good enough for him so long as he could venture into the deserts of the Southwest to clear his mind and feed his senses. If he wasn't obsessed he was probably depressed. If he didn't have a deadline he was likely lazy. Or so he said.
He didn't tolerate superficial relationships well -- "Yes, to hell with it. Let's call an end to this inane, pointless, worthless pretense at communication. If you're not bored with it, I certainly am." But he knew the value of a good friendship -- "So, let me know what you [Wendell Berry] think, if you care to trouble yourself about this. I would not want to risk endangering the kind of feelings you've shown me in the past for the sake of mere polemical spleen. Your friendship is far more important to me than striving to win points in a formal debate."
He complained, but with a touch of humor -- "This is a complaint. . . What kind of people are you hiring as rangers these days? Where do you find them? They look and act like cops - not rangers - and the next time one of these armed and uniformed goons bothers me I'm going to try to find out if he knows anything about the history, wildlife, plant life or geology of Saguaro National Monument." And - "Your reviewer . . . gives us a good forthright description of the book's author. As the undersigned can testify from personal acquaintance, Edward Abbey is indeed an "arrogant," "xenophobic," "puerile," "smug" and "dopey" sort of fellow. So far, fair enough. But what about the book . . . [he] forgot to review the book."
In the Forward to the book, Terry Tempest Williams wonders what Abbey would be saying right now if he were still alive. "Postcards from Ed" gives us more than a clue. Abbey would not be surprised by today's converging catastrophes and our, so called, war on terror. He might say we get what we deserve. "Postcards from Ed" is another chance to hear Abbey's prophetic voice. I suspect he would say, "Hey, you're still alive, wake up!"


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Founding Gardeners: The Revolutionary Generation, Nature, and the Shaping of the American Nation Review

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(More customer reviews)Andrea Wulf is a graceful and stylish wordsmith. Her subject is the fact that farming and gardening and garden design were central concerns of all the founding fathers. The focus is on Washington, Adams, Jefferson and Madison. Lots of detail here about their own gardens and estates: the design of the space, the plants they favored for both food and beauty, and the time and energy they spent on these matters. Good chapter on the Lewis and Clark expedition and its impact on gardeners. Lots of detail, but never dull even to this non-gardener.

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