Writing the Western Landscape (Concord Library) - Hardcover

Austin, Mary; Muir, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 080708526X ISBN 13: 9780807085264

Publisher: Beacon Press, 1994

Synopsis

The early twentieth-century works of Mary Austin and John Muir are nature-writing classics. Midwesterners by birth, Austin and Muir both adopted the American West as their home and wrote about its grand and wild landscapes in ways that came to define the genre of western nature writing.
Here, for the first time in a single volume, are excerpts from both writers' work: Austin's Earth Horizon and The Land of Journeys' Ending and Muir's The Grand Canon of the Colorado and Travels in Alaska. An introduction by Ann Zwinger provides literary analysis and biographical context and explores the two writers' influence on a tradition of western nature writing that continues today.

About this title

Review:

Two of this country's greatest writers on the natural world.--Washington Post Book World
"As thinkers and artists, [Austin and Muir] were made by the West. Though neither was born in it, they found it their spiritual home, the source of their power. Their writing about it is an act of acknowledgment, a gift from the heart. From them we still learn to see our mountains."--Ursula K. Le Guin, Portland Oregonian
"John Muir and Mary Austin exemplify the patterns and perspectives of classic nature writing. . . . Muir appears as the solitary, romantic explorer . . . [while Austin's] feminism and inclusivity point up the limitations of the romantic excursion as a basis for sustainable relations with land."--John Tallmadge, Orion

Synopsis:

Presents selections from Mary Austin's autobiography, "Earth Horizons," and from her "The Land of Journeys Ending," along with John Muir's "The Grand Canon of the Colorado" and an excerpt from his "Travels in Alaska".

About this edition

• Publisher: Beacon Press
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 080708526X
• ISBN 13: 9780807085264
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 176
• Editor: Ann H. Zwinger