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By Edward Abbey. Edward Abbey's account of two summers spent in
southeastern Utah's canyonlands is one of the most enduring
works of contemporary American nature writing. The noted author's most enduring nonfiction work is an account of
Abbey's seasons as a ranger at Arches National Park outside Moab, Utah.
Abbey reflects on the nature of the Colorado Plateau desert, on the
condition of our remaining wilderness, and on the future of a
civilization that cannot reconcile itself to living in the natural
world. He also recounts adventures with scorpions and snakes, obstinate
tourists and entrenched bureaucrats, and, most powerful of all, with
his own mortality. Abbey's account of getting stranded in a rock pool
down a side branch of the Grand Canyon is at once hilarious and
terrifying.
"I confess to being a nature lover,"
admits Abbey more than thirty years after his sojourn in the
wilderness. "But I did not mean to be mistaken for a
nature writer. I never wanted to be anything but a
writer, period." First published in 1968 to "a few
brief but not hostile notices," Desert Solitaire
quietly sold out of its first printing and eventually
developed a loyal following in paperback.
"An American Masterpiece. A Forceful Encounter with a Man of Character and Courage." -- The New Yorker.
"Like a ride on a bucking bronco...rough, tough, combative. The author
is a rebel and an eloquent loner. His is a passionately felt, deeply
poetic book...set down in a lean, racing prose, in a close-knit style
of power and beauty." -- The New York Times Book Review
But perhaps the
spirit of the man, the work, and the circumstances of its
writing were best summarized by Larry McMurtry in his review
for the Washington Post: "Edward Abbey is the
Thoreau of the American West."
Softcover; 288 pages.
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