Coming into McPhee country: John McPhee and the art of literary nonfiction

Abstract

John McPhee, who won the Pulitzer Prize in 1999 forAnnals of the Former is considered one of the most distinguished writers of literary nonfiction.Coming into McPhee Countryis the first comprehensive anthology to address his significant body of work. The first section, 'The Evolving Writer, ' examines his work from a biographical point of view, explaining background and influences that affected his development as a The second section, 'McPhee and the Natural World, ' focuses on his representations of the natural world and explores his work from the framework of both wilderness and urban environmentalism. The final section, 'The Writerly Challenges of McPhee, ' discusses his rhetorical choices in structure and style and demonstrates how his seemingly artless presentation is literary in every sense of the word. Overall, this volume salutes McPhee s enormous and enormously varying oeuvre and confirms his stature as a major American writer.