The Fall into Eden: Landscape and Imagination in California by David Wyatt

Abstract

Reviews The Fall into Eden: Landscape and Imagination in California. By David Wyatt. (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1986. 280 pages, $24.95.) David Wyatt begins with a personal anecdote which evolves into the thesis of his study. The pastoral Los Angeles home place built by his father and uncles, where the author played as a child, has since been obliterated by a freeway off-ramp: The California I grew up in was a beautiful, now vanished garden__ California has always been a place no sooner had than lost; every family has its paved garden. There is a recurring pattern in the exper­ ience of place in California that echoes our First Story, (xv) So, through the writings of eleven California authors (with much passing dis­ cussion of others), Wyatt traces the “experience of place,” the interaction of imagination and landscape—a story of Eden found and lost. The Fall into Eden is an ambitious book, intended to invite comparison with works of the Big Four listed in his prologue: Franklin Walker, Carey McWilliams, Kevin Starr, and William Everson. It is worthy of this company. Wyatt displays a wide-ranging, stimulating intellect, creates unexpected link­ ages, provokes insights. Within the framework of his larger thesis, each chapter has its own, often unexpected angle of vision. The chapter on “Norris and the Vertical” is a significant addition to the scholarship on that author. An apt comparison of Jeffers and Snyder (the “California Milton” and the “California Wordsw'orth”) illuminates both poets. Even on topics which might seem mined out—Muir’s epiphany of Mt. Ritter, the contrast of Muir and King, Chandler’s detective fiction—Wyatt has something fruitful to say. The passing discussions of figures secondary to his study yield valuable insights as well: it is gratifying, for example, to see Yvor Winters discussed in the context of California poets. Wyatt’s thesis is never mechanically applied, and the book concludes with a series of “paradoxes” which acknowledge its limits. As self-critical and aware as the author is, however, one important reservation needs to be registered. The Eden myth restricts Wyatt’s study of California culture to the JudeoChristian heritage, essentially the legacy of Puritanism—even when discussing Snyder and Jeffers, who reject that tradition. His list of core figures contains ten white men and one white woman: Dana, Leonard, Fremont, Muir, King, Austin, Norris, Steinbeck, Chandler, Jeffers, and Snyder. Wyatt’s thesis thus 234 Western American Literature obscures the cultural diversity which is the most important fact of all about California. What sensibility toward the landscape, shaped by alternative cul­ tural myths, might be found in the writings of California Hispanics and Asians, among others, we are left to wonder. CHARLES L. CROW Bowling Green State University The Oregon Trail: Yesterday and Today; A Brief History and PictorialJourney Along the Wagon Tracks of Pioneers. By William E. Hill. (Caldwell, Idaho: The Caxton Printers, Ltd., 1987. 179 pages, $9.95). William Hill presents here a profusely illustrated guide to the famous trail, designed for a novice who wants to follow' it and see where history was made. Several maps are available throughout the text. A handy fold-out map at the beginning of the book indicates the locations of key sites along the trail. Sample pages from popular contemporary emigrant guides give the reader a taste of trail life and what was required to prepare for the overland crossing. The author also includes passages from diaries kept by these Oregon Trail travelers, thus conveying to the reader the feelings of joy and hardship during the over­ land journey. Half of the book is a pictorial section featuring paintings and drawings of William Henry Jackson, Alfred J. Miller and William Henry Tappan. These illustrations of sites along the historical trail are compared to modern-day photographs of the trail taken by the author during his own explorations. Many places look the same, but other sites are on the verge of being destroyed by modern encroachments. Tourists will find use for the lists of museums and displays relating to the trail. Sites such as Scotts Bluff and Fort Laramie are preserved by the National Park Service; other sites such as Fort...