the john muir exhibit - press_releases - apostle of nature
by Thurman Wilkins
(
from the publisher's press release
)
John Muir: Apostle of Nature
by Thurman Wilkins
1995
University of Oklahoma Press, Norman
336 pages, 23 illustrations, 3 maps,
bibliographical notes, index, $24.95, cloth.
Naturalist and conservation leader John Muir's life and dedication
to the preservation movement are discussed in a new book published by the
University of Oklahoma Press.
John Muir: Apostle of Nature,
by Thurman
Wilkins, is Volume 8 in The Oklahoma Western Biographies.
Nearly a century after John Muir's death, his works remain in
print, his name is familiar, and his thought is much with us. How Muir's
life made him a leader and brought him insights destined to resonate for
decades is the central question underlying this biography by Thurman
Wilkins.
Born in Scotland, Muir came from a stern background of religious
fundamentalism. Life grew sterner yet when the family immigrated to the
United States and undertook the backbreaking task of developing a farm in
Wisconsin, but Muir's fertile mind enabled him to escape farm drudgery by
means of bizarre inventions. Armed with a university introduction to
geology and botany, he became a consummate walker, tramping the Canadian
forests, the southeastern woodlands, the Sierra Nevada, and several Alaskan
glaciers until he had learned about wilderness at nature's own knee.
Profoundly attached to dramatic wild places and plants, and to the
Sierra and the redwoods in particular, Muir spearheaded efforts to protect
forest areas and have some designated as national parks. Muir's wilderness
ethic, as revealed in his books, letters, and journals, rests on his
conception of the proper relationship between human culture and wild nature
as one of humility and respect for all life.
In the last decades of his life, John Muir was committed to
preserving wild places for their own sake, because of their spiritual and
aesthetic values. He became the acknowledged leader of the preservation
wing of the conservation movement, and today the half-million strong Sierra
Club that he founded for mountain advocacy and headed until his death,
continues to shape legislation and public opinion regarding the wilds.
John Muir's views seem scarcely to have aged; he is a vivid
continuing presence in preservationism and remains its chief apostle.
Thurman Wilkins, Professor Emeritus of English in New York's
Queen's College, is also the author of
Thomas Moran: Artist of the Mountains,
and
Cherokee Tragedy: The Ridge Family and the Decimation of a People,
both published by the University of Oklahoma Press.
The University of Oklahoma Press
1005 Asp Avenue
Norman, Oklahoma 73019
(405) 325-5111
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