Heart-Pine Russia

“Russia’s geography is rich in forest, and it’s culture is abundant in the spirits and heroes that traverse it. The national literature has ventured deep into these woods, but Western critics have only rarely followed. Costlow’s marvelous book stands in the middle of this forest and points to wonders all around. This is a beautiful, meditative, and insightful book that opens up new worlds of appreciation for both literature and nature.” — William Nickell on Jane T. Costlow’s Heart-Pine Russia: Walking and Writing the Nineteenth-Century Forest

Russia has more woodlands than any country in the world, and its forests have loomed large in Russian folklore, culture, and history. Russan forests have long been the focus of naturalist wonder, scientific scrutiny, and poetic imagination. For some the forest was the imaginary landscape of their religious homeland, for others it was the locus of peasant culture and local knowledge. In Heart-Pine Russia, Jane Costlow explores the central place the forest has held in the Russian imagination.

Costlow considers the work of authors such as Turgenev and Tolstoy, and artists like Shishkin, Repin, and Nesterov. One of our favorite chapters focuses on Dmitrii Kaigorodov, a forester and natural historian who was a John Burroughs-like figure offering popular works in the end of the Imperial era. (His most famous book was titled Chats about the Russian Forest — the Land Library’s latest book we would love to find!).

Author John Randolph has this to say about Heart-Pine Russia: “The struggle to really see and hear the life of Russia’s forests infuses Costlow’s story with many lyrical moments…” The Land Library is thrilled to find a book with so many fresh insights into another culture’s natural history traditions. Jane Costlow’s book joins several more on our shelves:

One of the first Russian natural history books we ever read: Nature’s Diary by Mikhail Prishvin (the Penguin edition includes an appreciation from John Updike), and a former Land Series book, The Storks’ Nest: Life and Love in the Russian Countryside, Laura Williams’ wonderful memoir of moving from Colorado to live and work in the Russian outback, eventually marrying international nature photographer Igor Shpilenok.

The Reindeer People: Living with Animals and Spirits in Siberia, anthropologist Piers Vitebsky’s sensitively drawn portrait of native people in the modern world, and Dersu the Trapper, V.K. Arseniev’s (1872-1930) description of three expeditions to the Ussurian taiga (along the Sea of Japan) and his classic encounters with the solitary aboriginal hunter named Dersu. It’s amazing how many current-day nature writers have been influenced by Arseniev’s book!

The Tiger: A True Story of Revenge and Survival — one of the most popular books the Land Library Book Club has ever read. Covering the same landscape as Dersu the Trapper, John Vaillant tells the tale of the mighty Amur tiger, and the hard life of the Russian outback. A wonderful writer! As is, Ian Frazier. His Travels in Siberia describes the land, the people, and the dark chapters of Russia’s Siberian experience.

“Who are we when we enter the forest? What happens to our personalities, our languages, our histories, our narratives? The essays in this book explore a tradition of writing and envisioning Russia’s great European forest — diminished and vulnerable, but lovely and powerful and in many ways daunting to those who entered it…” Jane T. Costlow, in Heart-Pine Russia: Walking and Writing the Nineteenth-Century Forest

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Brilliant!

We’re excited! Once again, through the kind donation of a very thoughtful Land Library supporter, we have just received a fresh batch of brilliant British nature books. It’s like walking into your local bookstore with every book brand new to your eyes.

Here’s one of our favorites: Patrick Barkham’s The Butterfly Isles: A Summer in Search of Our Emperors and Admirals (pictured above). In the grand tradition of a birder’s Big Year, Barkham sets out over the course of a single summer to discover how many British butterflies he can see. Along the way, he paints a vivid portrait of the admirable and eccentric butterfly collectors of the past, not to mention those he meets on the road. Margaret Drabble loved this book, commenting that “readers will be astonished by details of the teeming natural world that we so blindly inhabit.”

Another unique addition to the Land Library’s shelves is also pictured above, Nature Tales: Encounters with Britain’s Wildlife, edited by Michael Allen & Sonya Patel Ellis. This thoughtful anthology gathers together most of Britain’s leading writers and naturalists. Here’s just a few: Charles Darwin, Charles Waterton, Colin Tudge, Dorothy Wordsworth, Edward A. Armstrong, Edward Grey, Henry Williamson, J.A. Baker, John Clare, Kathleen Jamie, Mark Cocker, Miriam Rothschild, Richard Jefferies, Richard Mabey, Robert Mcfarlane, Roger Deakin, William Cobbett, R.M. Lockley — and that’s just a partial list. A wonderful collection!

And rounding out our latest brilliant box of British Books are these one-of-a-kind volumes:

Men and the Fields by Adrian Bell (the author traveled through East Anglia before modern agriculture altered the landscape forever. Ronald Blythe has called Bell’s book “among the best rural literature of the 20th century.”), The Plot: A Biography of an English Acre by Madeleine Bunting (what a wonderful place-based book — the multi-faceted story of a one-acre plot on the Yorkshire Moors), The Lie of the Land: An Under-the-Field Guide to the British Isles by Ian Vince (Vince brings to life a prehistoric Britain with red desert sands, molten rivers of lava, and great tectonic collisions).

The Nature of Scotland: Landscape, Wildlife and People by Magnus Magnusson & Graham White (a terrific primer & full of color photos), Map of a Nation: A Biography of the Ordnance Survey by Rachel Hewitt (the Land Library is lucky enough to have several books on the U.S. Geological Survey’s work & explorations — now, here’s a book that tells a similar story of painstaking progress and adventure, this time on the British Isles), The Living Mountain by Nan Shepherd (a beautifully written look at the misty mountain environment of the Cairngorms. Jim Perrin, writing in The Guardian, had this high praise, describing The Living Mountain as “the finest book ever written on nature and landscape in Britain.”).

A Year in the Woods by Chris Elford (the day-to-day adventures & sensitive observations of a forest ranger on the Dorset/Wiltshire border, At the Water’s Edge: A Personal Quest for Wildness by John Lister-Kaye (for thirty years John Lister-Kaye has taken the same circular walk from his home in the Scottish Highlands. His walk, and this book, describes the constant evolution of one of Britain’s best-known naturalists. Lister-Kaye is also the founder of the world-renowned Aigas Field Centre).

For more on Britain’s vast literature on the land, be sure to check out a few of our earlier posts!

–A Brilliant Box Of British Books: The New Naturalists

–A Brilliant Box of British Bird Books

–A Brilliant Box of British Bee Books

–Nuts for Huts

–Assume the Stillness of a Tree

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The Biblioburros of Columbia

The latest addition to our Waterton Canyon Kids Library is Jeanette Winter’s Biblioburro: A True Story from Columbia, a picture book about one man’s never-say-never passion for sharing stories and books. Jeanette Winter has written and illustrated many books for children based on true-life stories, including Wangari’s Trees of Peace, and The Librarian of Basra. Here’s what she has to say about her latest book:

“Biblioburro is based on the true story of Luis Soriano, who lives in La Gloria, a remote town in northern Columbia. An avid reader, Luis understood the transformative power of reading because of his experiences as a schoolteacher. He wanted to share his collection of books with the children and adults in the isolated villages in the distant hills, where books were scarce. Most houses had none.

Luis and his two burros began bringing books to the villages in 2000. He started with a collection of 70 books that has grown to over 4,800, mostly from donations. Now the Biblioburro travels to the hills every weekend. Three hundred people, more or less, look forward to borrowing the books Luis brings.

A small corner of the world is enriched.” — Jeanette Winter

People around here love stories. I’m trying to keep that spirit alive in my own way. — Luis Soriano

And here’s another fun picture book, Waiting for the Biblioburro by Monica Brown and John Parra. For more information be sure to visit the Biblioburro blogspot!

Being the book-people (book-nuts?) that we are, we especially love the following three titles from our Waterton Canyon Kids Library — each one affirms the power and value of books across the world:

Down Cut Shin Creek: The Pack Horse Librarians of Kentucky by Kathi Appelt & Jeanne Cannella Schmitzer, My Librarian is a Camel: How Books are Brought to Children Around the World by Margriet Ruurs, The Library Book: The Story of Libraries from Camels to Computers by Maureen Sawa & Bill Slavin

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The Accumulated Wisdom of Anonymous Builders

Among our favorite books at the Land Library are those devoted to traditional architecture across the globe — so often simple and elegant structures built with the natural elements at hand. Yoshio Komatsu has devoted the last twenty-five years to photographing the wide diversity of homemade shelters. Built by Hand: Vernacular Buildings Across the World (with text by Bill & Athena Steen and Eiko Komatsu) is a hefty omnibus of Yoshio’s work. It’s hard to improve on the authors’ own words as they describe their book:

Built by Hand is a celebration of what is so uniquely diverse and yet similar in the buildings of different cultures around the world. Beginning with the basic ways that human beings have sought shelter — beneath the trees and stars, under protection of a rock cliff or cave — this book traces the transformation of materials such as earth, stone, wood or bamboo, into shelter.”

What Yoshio Komatsu has captured with his camera, John Taylor has equaled with his pen-and-ink drawings. A Shelter Sketchbook: Timeless Building Solutions (also pictured above) contains more than 600 elegantly simple and practical structures — the accumulated wisdom of anonymous builders, all responsive to their immediate environment and the available resources.

Here’s a few more fun books from the Land Library’s shelves:

Wonderful Houses Around the World by Yoshio Komatsu (a young adult version of Komatsu’s work, housed at our Waterton Canyon Kids Library), and the latest addition to our vernacular architecture section: Buildings Without Architects: A Global Guide to Everyday Architecture by John May.

And, here’s a true classic. We love this book so much that we have more than a few copies on hand:

Shelter, edited by Lloyd Kahn. With the oversize shape of a road atlas, Shelter is as information-packed as the Whole Earth Catalog, with over 1,250 illustrations. A true sourcebook of invention and inspiration!

You can imagine how excited we were recently when we came across Lloyd Kahn’s latest book, Tiny Homes, Simple Shelter: Scaling Back in the 21st Century. Here’s more from the author himself:

“Here are some 150 builders who have created tiny homes (under 500 sq. ft.). There are some 1,300 photos of homes on land, homes on wheels, homes on the road, homes on water, even homes in the trees. There are also studios, saunas, garden sheds, and greenhouses.
Here are builders, designers, architects (no less), dreamers, artists, road gypsies, and water dwellers who’ve achieved a measure of freedom and independence by taking shelter into their own hands.” — Lloyd Kahn

For more on scaling back, and building small, be sure to check out more great books featured on one of our favorite earlier posts:

–Small Blueprints for a Brighter Future

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Rigorous Science & Passionate Concern: George Schaller’s Latest Work

George Schaller has been described as one of the finest wildlife biologists of all time. At the age of 26 he traveled to Central Africa to study and live with Mountain Gorillas, embarking on the first field study of those gentle giants. Over the next fifty years, George Schaller’s field work took him from Africa to the Tibetan Plateau. Most remarkably, Schaller’s dogged research continually inspired subsequent wildlife protection wherever he pitched his tent across the globe.

Many, many years ago the Land Library purchased our first Schaller book, somewhere along the 8-miles of books at New York City’s venerable Strand Book Store. The Serengeti Lion: A Study of Predator-Prey Relations (pictured above) was one of the first studies of the lion’s social life, and it set us on the path to gather all of George Schaller’s works, including his 2007 memoir, A Naturalist and Other Beasts: Tales From a Life in the Field (also pictured above).

Learn more about each chapter of Schaller’s remarkable life, in books such as these!

A Life in the Wild: George Schaller’s Struggle to Save the Last Great Beasts by Pamela S. Turner (from our Waterton Canyon Kids Nature Library), The Giant Pandas of Wolong by George Schaller, Hu Jinchu, Pan Wenshi & Zhu Jing, The Mountain Gorilla: Ecology and Behavior.

For the last many years, George Schaller’s field studies have centered on China, Tibet, and the greater Himalayan region, captured in books such as these: Stones of Silence: Journeys in the Himalayas, Tibet’s Hidden Wilderness: Wildlife and Nomads of the Chang Tang Reserve, Wildlife of the Tibetan Steppe.

Collecting all of George Schaller’s books has been a rewarding pursuit, so imagine our excitement this week when we opened a box containing his very latest work:

“This is a remarkably close-up and revealing story from the world’s top field scientist. In Tibet Wild Schaller addresses such little known creatures as Marco Polo sheep, snow leopards, chiru antelope, horse-like kiang and the peoples that live with them. He writes penetratingly, but with a grace and sensitivity that touches the heart.” — William Conway, Senior Conservationist, Wildlife Conservation Society

Before the Himalayas, before Africa, came Alaska’s Brooks Range. In 1956, as a 23-year old graduate student, George Schaller joined an Alaskan wildlife expedition led by the legendary biologist Olaus Murie:

“Olaus encouraged George’s wanderings. He believed a scientist should gather his or her data on foot, every sense alert, notebook and camera in hand….For George, the Murie expedition was to become the model for the rest of his career: exploration, rigorous science, passionate conservation, and a deep, heartfelt connection to wild places and wild animals.” — from A Life in the Wild by Pamela S. Turner.

Fifty years later, in the summer of 2006, George Schaller returned to Alaska’s north in the company of three fresh young graduate students — the next generation of field biologists to come!

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The Relationship We Have with the Land

“The destinies of communities over similar shale gas reserves — in Alabama, Louisiana, Wyoming, Arkansas, Texas, Colorado, and other places — are linked to the Marcellus region by local geology and global energy concerns. In all these shale gas regions, the relationships people have with the land, and with their neighbors, are as complicated and multidimensional as the topographical and geological terrain. Here, too, there are cracks. They are created by forces that sometimes pull in opposite directions, at other times collide with great force, and often are buried from view.” — Tom Wilber, Under the Surface

The story is complex, and in no way easy. What you have, in pockets across the country, is a natural gas reserve trapped in rock, that if released, might meet our domestic demands for decades. Along comes an extraction technology, hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”), that involves injecting drill holes with a mix of water, sand, and chemicals under pressure great enough to split rock and free the gas within (described in a short film clip below).

That frames what has become a fierce debate about the safety and advisability of fracking. Will it contaminate the underground aquifers? What about the surface waste, and the close proximity of drill rigs to people’s homes? Fracking has quickly become a debate over energy, climate change, health, water, jobs, and the economy.

At this time, we know of two books on this multifaceted issue, but there will be many more. The latest is Tom Wilber’s Under the Surface: Fracking, Fortunes, and the Fate of the Marcellus Shale.

The Marcellus Formation underlies significant parts of West Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York State. Its gas-rich shale has spurred a modern day “gold rush”, and that’s the tale Tom Wilber tells through the voices of gas company representatives, local residents, farmers, politicians, and government workers. Eric Schaeffer, former director of the EPA Office of Civil Enforcement had this to say about Under the Surface:

“Tom Wilber’s thoughtful review of the Gold Rush mentality that drives the fracking industry should give pause to those who think cheap natural gas is the answer to our energy problem. Under the Surface makes sure we hear from those who support development of the Marcellus Shale formation, as well as the skeptics.”

And here’s an earlier book, also focused on the Marcellus Shale:

The End of Country: Dispatches from the Frack Zone by Seamus McGraw (“This is an environmental tale on the surface, yet something more powerful lurks beneath the soil of this wonderful book. Seamus McGraw is really writing about the enduring complexities and contradictions of the United States. He goes beyond the easy stereotypes of greedy promoters preying on farmers and gives us the unvarnished truth about a twenty-first century energy rush in a place we never expected it.” — Tom Zoellner, author of Uranium). Also pictured above: Sandra Steingraber has written several books on the environmental hazards of everyday life. Her most recent, Raising Elijah: Protecting Our Children in an Age of Environmental Crisis, includes an examination of the health concerns surrounding hydraulic fracturing.

Whether you live above the Marcellus Shale, or along the Rocky Mountain Front, fracking and our entire energy future will remain a critical issue for years to come. The Land Library hopes to keep current with all the information that we’ll need!

A drilling rig in Meshoppen, Pennsylvania. Once a rig is in place, the work of gas extraction goes on around the clock. — from Seamus McGraw’s The End of Country.

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Lion Land

“In the end the survival of the Mara will depend upon the outcome of an ancient struggle between the world’s two top predators — lions and humans.” — Brian Jackman

We’re excited to see this new updated edition of Brian Jackman’s 1982 wildlife classic, The Marsh Lions: The Story of an African Tribe. For five years Jackman, and photographer Jonathan Scott, followed the Marsh pride through the Masai Mara region of Kenya, along the Tanzania border. With time they came to know each lion as the distinct individuals they are. This is a extremely well-told, and complex story of the African plains, full of encounters with cheetahs, wild dogs, hyena, giraffe, topi, eland, impala, zebra, buffalo, and gazelle. It’s such a rich tapestry of life, you might want to have Richard Despard Estes’ The Behavoir Guide to African Mammals (also pictured above) on hand for quick reference!

Here’s a terrific BBC film clip on the marsh lions of Africa:

Here’s another richly illustrated lion tale, set farther south, in Botswana’s Okavango Delta:

Relentless Enemies: Lions and Buffalo by Beverly and Dereck Joubert.

Closer to home, here’s two excellent titles to help your study of one of our very own native cats — the mountain lion:

Cougar: Ecology and Conservation, edited by Maurice Hornocker, Sharon Negri, and Alan Rabinowitz, and Listening to Cougar, edited by Marc Bekoff and Cara Blessley-Lowe, a collection of essays from writers such as J. Frank Dobie and Rick Bass.

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The Earth is Faster Now

“After a two-night battle with the Chukchi Sea, the message was clear: the village of Kivalina must be moved. Adapting to our environment was no longer possible. The only option left for the Inupiaq people of Kivalina was to get out of the way and let the impacts of climate change take their toll on the small barrier island.” — Colleen Swan, Kivalina Tribal Administrator

Coastal communities across the globe are serving as climate change’s canaries-in-the-mine. The tiny Alaskan village of Kivalina has been feeling the change for many years now. Sea ice no longer protects Kivalina from savage storms, and more and more of the island falls into the sea.

And, there are other signs of a new world coming. Tribal Administrator Colleen Swan:

“… for decades the people of Kivalina had noticed subtle changes that indicated a warming climate. These included poor ocean ice conditions that changed the way the community hunted on the ocean, and melting permafrost in many areas of Alaska, including the Inupiaq people’s aboriginal territory. Other changes included earlier than normal migration of sea mammals — a main staple of the Inupiaq people’s diet — and unpredictable weather conditions…“

Christine Shearer’s Kivalina: A Climate Change Story tells the Inupiaq’s story — a frustrating tale of environmental injustice, one that government, business (and all of us) have yet to address.

Also pictured above: the stories and photos of Climate Refugees (by the journalists & photographers of Collectif Argos) offers a global perspective on the first populations facing displacement by climate change — communities from Africa and the Himalayas, to the South Pacific and the Gulf Coast of Louisiana.

And here’s two more volumes from the Land Library’s shelves, full of early warnings from the field:

The Big Thaw: Travels in the Melting North by Ed Struzik (“Stuzik’s thoughtful reportage offers readers an arresting portrait of how quickly the northern landscape, including every ecological nook and cranberry bog that humans and other species inhabit, is being transformed.” — Canadian Geographic), and The Earth is Faster Now: Indigenous Observations of Arctic Environmental Change, edited by Igor Krupnik & Dyanna Jolly (an incredibly valuable resource!).

For more on the early signs of climate change, please read our earlier post on one of the most thought-provoking books of the past year:

–The Fate of Greenland

We are upsetting the atmosphere upon which all life depends. In the late 80s when I began to take climate change seriously, we referred to global warming as a “slowmotion catastrophe” one we expected to kick in perhaps generations later. Instead, the signs of change have accelerated alarmingly. — David Suzuki

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The Never-Ending Journeys of Marianne North

Marianne North (1830-1890) was a legendary Victorian traveler, an accomplished painter, and an extremely knowledgeable botanist. After many years of caring for her father, Marianne (at the age of forty) began an astonishing series of trips around the globe. Her primary goal was to paint plants in their natural habitats, and for the next fourteen years she trekked to Canada, the United States, Brazil, Tenerife, Japan, Singapore, Borneo, Java, Sri Lanka, India, Australia, South Africa, the Seychelles, and Chile.

Luckily, North was also a prolific diarist. A new selection of her writings has just been published, Abundant Beauty: The Adventurous Travels of Marianne North, Botanical Artist (pictured above), condensed from her three-volume Recollections of a Happy Life.

Marianne North was especially known for the scientific accuracy with which she painted her botanical subjects:

Several plants that Marianne North painted were new to science, and many were eventually named in her honor, including Nepenthes northiana (pictured above), a new pitcher plant found in the limestone mountains of Borneo — alongside North’s painting of the fruit and foliage of Sterculia parviflora.

As remarkable as her globe-trotting travels were, Marianne North began one of the most important chapters in her life when she returned home to England for the last time. In her last days, Marianne oversaw the design and construction of a gallery to house her work, all of which she donated to the Royal Kew Gardens. She arranged the paintings and hung them herself, as well as painting the decorative panels surrounding the doorways. The gallery first opened in 1882, and was an immediate sensation, bringing exotic lands and plant forms home to Victorian England

Michelle Payne’s Marianne North: A Very Intrepid Painter provides a wonderful visual tour of North’s life, and of the Marianne North Gallery at Kew. Over 800 paintings are hung edge to edge, in one of the most impressive displays imaginable.

Many, many years ago we literally stumbled into this gallery, totally unaware of Marianne North or her work. Thus began one of the most memorable gallery visits of our lives:

The Marianne North Gallery recently underwent a complete renovation. The tile floors returned, and the gallery has never looked better. Take a quick tour for yourself!

Marianne North in Jamacia: Leonotis nepetaefolia & Hummingbirds:

“Marianne North finally reached her long-dreamt-of tropics on Christmas Eve 1871, when her steamer docked at Kingston Bay. Despite feeling ‘entirely alone and friendless’ upon arrival, in the end she stayed for five months.
She quickly established herself in an enormous ramshackle house in the old botanic gardens….She used the large upper-floor veranda, which opened to a spectacular view of the valley, as her main living space. The valley’s vegetation was so rich and varied it overwhelmed Marianne, who recalls being ‘in a state of ecstasy,’ declaring in her Recollections that she ‘hardly knew what to paint first.’ She quickly established a daily routine of going out to paint at daylight and returning at noon. In the afternoons, when it often rained, she stayed at home but continued painting from inside the house. Then, after sunset, she would take an exploratory walk, returning home in the dark.” — from Marianne North: A Very Intrepid Painter by Michelle Payne.

For much more on Marianne North’s life and work be sure to visit the Kew Gardens website — it’s a terrific site!

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From the African Savannah to the Wind River Mountains of Wyoming

It’s always a thrill to come across a new book by David Lewis-Williams, a world leading rock art-expert for over thirty years. His latest book centers on the prehistory of his native South Africa: Deciphering Ancient Minds: The Mystery of San Bushman Rock Art (co-authored with Sam Challis).

The prehistoric San people left a remarkable number of picture galleries across east and southern Africa, some dating back to approximately 27,000 years ago. Deciphering Ancient Minds is richly illustrated, and full of insights into San beliefs and ways of thought — showing the prehistoric bushman society to be easily as complex and sophisticated as our own:

“Though less well known, these spiritual panoramas rival in complexity, detail and variety the Ice Age painted caverns of Western Europe, ancient Egyptian art and the intricately carved Maya temples and stelae.“

Lewis-Williams’ earlier book, The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art (also pictured above), is mainly focused on the wall and ceiling art found in French and Spanish caves, making it an excellent compliment to Deciphering Ancient Minds.

David Lewis-Williams, professor emeritus, Rock Art Research Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.

The Eland, a spiral-horned antelope of east and southern Africa — and a favorite subject of the San bushman artists.

Bringing this subject closer to home, Deciphering Ancient Minds spends a chapter comparing & contrasting prehistoric African rock art with the intriguing images from the Dinwoody tradition of the High Plains — highlighting the work of Julie Francis & Lawrence Loendorf, past participants of the Rocky Mountain Land Series:

For more on Rock Art & Cave Paintings be sure to check out our earlier posts!

–When the Earth Was Young

–Werner Herzog’s Cave of Forgotten Dreams

And for more on the Rock Art of the San Bushmen, here’s a 4 minute film clip produced by the Africa Heritage Fund, highlighting Giant’s Castle in the Drakensberg Mountains:

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