Nature's kindred spirits: Aldo Leopold, Joseph Wood Krutch, Edward Abbey, Annie Dillard, and Gary Snyder

Abstract

Aldo Leopold, Joseph Wood Krutch, Edward Abbey, Annie Dillard, Gary Snyder - these writers have all recorded their encounters with nature. In this volume, McClintock shows how their mystical experiences with the wild led to dramatic conversions in their thinking and behaviour, and to their rejection of modern alienation and spiritual confusion. From Aldo Leopold, one of America's most important conservationists and author of the classic A Sand County Almanac, to Pulitzer Prize winners Annie Dillard and Gary Snyder, and defenders of the desert, Joseph Wood Krutch and Edward Abbey, these writers share a common vision that harks back to Henry David Thoreau and John Muir. To 19th-century Romantic ideals, they add the authority of modern ecological science. Collectively, they have elevated nature's importance in American culture, shaping the growth of the environmental movement and influencing American environmental policies. Admired among educated readers but relatively neglected by the literary establishment, these writers unite the real with the metaphysical, the ordinary with the sacred, the personal with the public, and the natural with the social. Using ecology as a touchstone, McClintock further draws connections among science, politics, religion and philosophy to create an enlightening overview of the work of these kindred spirits.