Desert Solitaire: A Season in the Wilderness by Edward Abbey Summary and Reviews
|
List Price: Our Price: $4.27 You Save: $3.72 (47%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.40 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of Desert Solitaire: A Season in the Wilderness
Book Review: A classic
Summary: 5 Stars
Excellent. A must read for all with a concern for the American West.Book Review: A classic despite the contradictions
Summary: 5 Stars
I give this book 5 stars for Abbey's beautiful and vivid depiction of the Southwest landscape, and his ability to evoke a powerful sense of what's already been lost and what's at stake. This should be a must-read for anyone who loves the Southwest and cares about its future. At the same time, I have to say I agree with some of the comments by other reviewers about how he sometimes seems to be much more aware of how others impact the pristine wilderness areas than of how he does so himself. After reading his biting observations in the "Down the River" chapter about campers who left an old shoe in a spring and a dirty sock hanging from a bush, I was a little taken aback when he started the next chapter with the following story: "On the way we stopped off briefly to roll an old tire into the Grand Canyon. While watching the tire bounce over tall pine trees, tear hell out of a mule train and disappear with a final grand leap into the inner gorge..." Then on to the next adventure, with no further mention of the poor mule train or of the tire which will probably be there for hundreds of years longer than will the old shoe and sock. What makes that attitude even harder to understand is his obvious deep love for the natural beauty and wildness of the region. At times his lyrical reflections almost pass into the realm of the mystical and sublime, such as during his journey through the doomed Glen Canyon. Despite the occasional contradictions, this book is a classic, and I would strongly recommend it to anyone with an interest in the Southwest.Book Review: A cookbook for outdoor meals...Abbey style.
Summary: 5 Stars
Dare to be a rebel, try these Abbey recipes for yourself in the Southern Utah Wilderness.Book Review: A genuine and enduring classic about the American Desert
Summary: 5 Stars
Edward Abbey's DESERT SOLITAIRE belongs on the shortest of several short lists of 20th century classics, whether we are talking of classic literature of the American West, nature writing, or environmentalism. Why is this such a brilliant book? It isn't the originality of ideas. Other writers-Aldo Leopold, Wallace Stegner, Bernard DeVoto, Mary Austin-had already articulated many of Abbey's central ideas either about nature or about Western policy. Bernard DeVoto was an innovator; Abbey is not. Nor is Abbey's anger and fury at exploiters and defilers unique: DeVoto was just as irate and just as incapable of pulling his punches. Nor is it Abbey's overall vision that makes his book so compelling. Again, both DeVoto and Stegner-and especially DeVoto-evidenced a broader and more systematic understanding of the broader issues confronting the West. None of this is accidental. DeVoto exerted a major influence on Stegner, and Stegner taught Abbey in the Stanford University Creative Writing Program.
What makes DESERT SOLITAIRE so marvelous is the almost tactile love and passion Abbey displays for the Desert Southwest. Over and over Abbey summons up specific places, particular mountains, individual landscapes. Although he can write about the desert in general, he more frequently writes about particular spots in Arches National Park and the surrounding environs that help explain his attachment to the West. He is the literary equivalent, in his more somber, reflective moments, of Eliot Porter and Ansel Adams. As a result, what one recalls upon remembering DESERT SOLITAIRE is not words so much as a collection of images.
Structurally, the book only resembles a memoir of his time working as a park ranger in the Arches National Park. The book makes it seems as if he worked there only one year, when in fact he worked there two. Furthermore, even what appears as a single year fails to account for all the content of the book. He uses, rather, the fiction of a single season as a framework upon which to hang tales, reflections, and rants. This intermixing of narrative with asides gives the book a richness of texture it might not otherwise possess. The narrative of his time as a ranger gives the book much of it structure, but the rants and sidetracking provides it with much of its content.
I hate to write something as trite as this being an absolutely essential book for anyone remotely interested in the subjects it touches upon, but such is the case. Abbey wrote many other nonfiction works and novels. All are interesting, several of them quite good, but DESERT SOLITAIRE is easily his greatest. It truly is a classic.
Book Review: A must-read for any outdoor enthusiast
Summary: 5 Stars
Though more than 30 years old, this book is a classic that still holds its own today. Edward Abbey's months of living alone in the vast, uninhabited lands of southern Utah, which most of us will never do, provides a unique perspective on the beauty of the Canyonlands and the outdoors in general. His rafting trip down the Colorado River before it was dammed gives an excellent taste of an adventure that is, unfortunately, no longer possible. And his descriptions of the Maze and its remoteness seemed almost like a fantasy - to amazing to be true. Though reading about the beauty and uniqueness of this area of the country is nothing compared to visiting it, his comments on tourism and the sprawl of American society are particularly relevant today. Coming from a man who is integral in defining the modern conservation movement, this book is a must-read for any outdoor enthusiast.