The Open Space of Democracy
10 best books like The Open Space of Democracy (Terry Tempest Williams): The Abstract Wild, Eating Stone: Imagination and the Loss of the Wild, Trespass: Living at the Edge of the Promised Land, The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth, Blue Desert, The Land of Little Rain, The Wild Marsh: Four Seasons at Home in Montana, The Republic of Nature: An Environmental History of the United States, Down to Earth: Nature's Role in American History, The Quiet World: Saving Alaska's Wilderness Kingdom, 1879-1960
| Author | Jack Turner |
| ISBN | 0816516995 |
If anything is endangered in America it is our experience of wild nature—gross contact. There is knowledge only the wild can give us, knowledge specific to it, knowledge specific to the experience of it. These are its gifts to us.
How wild is wilderness and how wild are our experiences in it,...
Long believed to be disappearing and possibly even extinct, the Southwestern bighorn sheep of Utah’s canyonlands have made a surprising comeback. Naturalist Ellen Meloy tracks a band of these majestic creatures through backcountry hikes, downriver floats, and travels across the Southwest....
| Author | Amy Irvine |
| ISBN | 0865477035 |
Trespass is the story of one woman's struggle to gain footing in inhospitable territory. A wilderness activist and apostate Mormon, Amy Irvine sought respite in the desert outback of southern Utah's red-rock country after her father's suicide, only to find out just how much of an interloper she was...
| Author | Edward O. Wilson |
| ISBN | 0393062171 |
Dear Pastor:
We have not met, yet I feel I know you well enough to call you friend. First of all, we grew up in the same faith. Although I no longer belong to that faith, I am confident that if we met and spoke privately of our deepest beliefs, it would be in a spirit of mutual respect and goodwill....
| Author | Charles Bowden |
| ISBN | 0816510814 |
In the promised land of the Sunbelt, people come by the thousands to escape the crush of Eastern cities and end up duplicating the very world they have fled. Can the land remain unchanged?
In Blue Desert, Charles Bowden presents a view of the Southwest that seeks to measure how rapid growth has...
| Author | Mary Hunter Austin |
| ISBN | 0140249192 |
“Between the high Sierras south from Yosemite—east and south over a very great assemblage of broken ranges beyond Death Valley, and on illimitably into the Mojave Desert” is the territory that Mary Austin calls the Land of Little Rain. In this classic collection of meditations on the wonders...
| Author | Rick Bass |
| ISBN | 0547055161 |
The Wild Marsh is Rick Bass’s most mature, full account of life in the Yaak and a crowning achievement in his celebrated career. It begins with his family settling in for the long Montana winter, and captures all the subtle harbingers of change that mark each passing month — the initial cruel teasing...
The Republic of Nature: An Environmental History of the United States
| Author | Mark Fiege |
| ISBN | 0295991674 |
In the dramatic narratives that comprise The Republic of Nature, Mark Fiege reframes the canonical account of American history based on the simple but radical premise that nothing in the nation's past can be considered apart from the natural circumstances in which it occurred. Revisiting historical...
| Author | Ted Steinberg |
| ISBN | 0195140109 |
In this ambitious and provocative text, environmental historian Ted Steinberg offers a sweeping history of our nation--a history that, for the first time, places the environment at the very center of our story. Written with exceptional clarity, Down to Earth re-envisions the story of America "from...
In this fascinating follow-up to his New York Times bestseller Wilderness Warrior, acclaimed historian Douglas Brinkley offers a riveting, expansive look at the past and present battle to preserve Alaska’s wilderness. Brinkley explores the colorful diversity of Alaska’s wildlife, arrays...
| Author | Alison Hawthorne Deming |
| ISBN | 1571313486 |
Humans were surrounded by other animals from the beginning of time: they were food, clothes, adversaries, companions, jokes, and gods. And yet, our companions in evolution are leaving the world — both as physical beings and spiritual symbols — and not returning. In this collection of linked essays,...
| Author | Wendell Berry |
| ISBN | 0913098604 |
This slim volume packs a big punch. The first essay is one of the most thoughtful and non-American-centric critiques of the 9-11 tragedy. With humility Wendell Berry reflects on how this event challenged our prosperity mindset and how it should guide our future toward a more local, caring economy.
The...
| Author | Edward Abbey |
| ISBN | 0805006036 |
The book is divided into four parts: Politics, Travel, Books and Art and Nature Love (just one short bit on predator hunting calls and littering).
The Politics section is as expected: deep insights into Abbey's anarchic views, some founded in legitimate reason, others in a bit of selfish or...
| Author | Craig Childs |
| ISBN | 0316735884 |
Craig Childs seems to sort of breathe in nature -- not a deliberate inhalation, mind you, just a sort of unthinking absorption that occurs just by being in a place -- and then breathes out these words. His writing style can get a little heady, but hang in there; wait for a gentle mood, let yourself get intoxicated...
| Author | Barry Lopez |
| ISBN | 0679740996 |
Five hundred years ago an Italian whose name, translated into English, meant Christopher Dove, came to America and began a process not of discovery, but incursion -- "a ruthless, angry search for wealth" that continues to the present day. This provocative and superbly written book gives a true assessment...
Last Stand: America's Virgin Lands
| Author | Barbara Kingsolver |
| ISBN | 0792269098 |
"Last Stand takes readers from the tallgrass prairies of Kansas to the Arctic tundra of Alaska to the deserts of the Southwest and bears passionate witness to our last wildernesses, reminding us why they must be preserved. Dedicated conservationist and acclaimed novelist Barbara Kingsolver teams...
| Author | Gary Snyder |
| ISBN | 1887178279 |
Gary Snyder is a delight to read. His (clearly) gentle nature is introduced to the reader in his note in the front of this book , where he asks us to be "lean, compassionate and virtuously ferocious, living in the self-disciplined elegance of wild mind."
I love his poetry, but have always been drawn...
| Author | Kathleen Dean Moore |
| ISBN | 1558217800 |
Several essays really stood out which is what I'm looking for in reading a book like this(something relatable to my experiences). The essay "the song of the canyon wren" described something I've known my entire life, even as a child, but have never shared nor even knew how to put it into words! Moore says...
| Author | Edward Hoagland |
| ISBN | 1603583378 |
Called the best essayist of his time by luminaries like Philip Roth, John Updike, and Edward Abbey, Edward Hoagland brings readers his ultimate collection. In Sex and the River Styx, the author's sharp eye and intense curiosity shine through in essays that span his childhood exploring the woods in...
