​The Woods Stretched for Miles
 
I recently discovered some anthologies devoted to Southern nature Writing. Several noteworthy authors appear in The Woods Stretched for Miles: New Nature Writing from the South, 1999, UGA Press. Editoes Jon Lane and Gerald Thurmond are talented authors but did not include any of their own works in this anthology. I may review this anthology someday, but the following comments are more of a summary. 
 
Rick Bass (Mississippi) is acknowledged as a master of short stories and has published several fiction and nonfiction books. His essay “Good Day at Black Creek,” set in Mississippi, is drawn from his collection of essays Wild to the Heart, published by Stackpole Books. It is the story of a backpacking trip in Black Creek Wilderness, an area proposed for protection as a designated wilderness area.
 
Jan DeBlieu’s essay “Hurricane” is set in North Carolina and drawn from her book Hatteras Journal, which is recognized as essential reading for coastal conservationists. She has published additional books on the coastal Carolinas.
 
Wendell Berry has been called the dean of Southern writers. His essay “The Making of a Marginal Farm” is set in Kentucky and included in Recollected Essays (1980). It has since been published in other anthologies.
 
Eddy L. Harris contributed his essay “Vicksburg,” set in Mississippi. It also appeared as part of his book Mississippi Solo: A River Quest, in which he described his canoe trip down the length of the Mississippi River.
 
Franklin Burroughs received the John Burroughs Medal for best nature writing for his book Confluence: Merrymeeting Bay. For this volume, he contributed” Lake Waccamaw to Freeland,” chapter two of his book The River Home, in which he describes a canoe trip on the Waccamaw River. The essay is set in the Carolinas.
 
Christopher Camuto contributed the essay “Old Growth” from his book Another Country: Journeying Toward the Cherokee Mountains. It is set in North Carolina. With sensitivity to the landscape, he speaks about how to recognize the transition from forest to old-growth forest. He has written extensively about fly fishing and other sports. Other books include A Fly Fisherman’s Blue Ridge and Hunting from Home.  
 
Susan Cerulean contributed an essay, set in Florida, about field research on Swallow-tailed Kites. Her books include I Have Been Assigned the Single Bird: a Daughter’s Memoir and Tracking Desire: A Journey After Swallow-tailed Kites. She edited The Book of the Everglades and Between Two Rivers.  
 
Stephen Harrigan contributed “The Soul of the Treaty Oak,” an essay investigating the killing of a famous live oak with herbicide. Several twists and turns of the story reveal unique aspects of the culture of Austin, Texas. He authored Big Wonderful Thing: A History of Texas.
 
James Kilgo was a long-time professor at the University of Georgia. His essay “Actual Field Conditions” describes the difficulties of bird research in the field and is excerpted from his book Deep Enough or Ivorybills. He published several other books.  
 
Janet Lembke contributed the essay “River Time,” which first appeared as part of her book by the same title, set in North Carolina.
 
Barry Lopez contributed the essay “Theft: A Memoir,” set in Georgia and first appeared in his book About this Life. He is the author of numerous fiction and nonfiction books.
 
Harry Middleton authored the essay “Bagpipes on Hazel Creek,” in which he described Hazel Creek’s value as a trout fishing stream and the appearance of a mysterious piper in the surrounding wilderness. The essay is set in North Carolina and includes a description of Horace Kephart and his efforts to preserve the Great Smoky Mountains and Blue Ridge. Middleton died in 1993 after publishing In That Sweet Country, and The Earth is Enough.   
 
Janisse Ray is a resident of Georgia and an advocate for the Longleaf Pine Forest, the community of plants and animals it supports, and the Altamaha watershed. Her essay “Whither Thou Goest” is a look at her time in Montana, where she completed an MFA degree. She has authored a dozen books and is perhaps best known for Ecology of a Cracker Childhood and Wild Card Quilt.
 
Bland Simpson contributed the essay “The Great Dismal,” the final chapter of his book, The Great Dismal: A Carolinian’s Swamp Memoir.
 
Mary Q. Steele’s essay “The Living Year” is set in Tennessee. It is an excerpt from her book, The Living Year. She wrote natural history and children’s literature. In my Substack post, Writing Chattanooga: Southern by Nature, I comment on this book.
 
Archie Carr was a herpetologist and noted expert on marine turtles. His essay “Living with an Alligator” is an excerpt from his book of collected essays, A Naturalist in Florida: A Celebration of Eden.
 
Marilou Awiakta (Tennessee) is a nature writer of Cherokee and Appalachian heritage. She recently decided that the University of Tennessee library would be the home of her collected papers. Her essay “Daydreaming Primal Space” is an exposition on Native American thought as published in her book, Selu: Seeking the Corn Mother’s Wisdom, which I reviewed in my Substack post, Marilou Awiatka Speaks or a Living Culture. 

This item is crossposted from my Substack Account. 
I reviewed three books for the print edition of The Hellbender Press, Volume 7, Issue 7, November/December 2005. I mailed copies to the books’ authors via their publishers and received kind replies.  The essays became the first installment of my column, “Nature’s Bookshelf.  
Lamentably, the parent company folded The Hellbender Press, print edition, in 2008, bringing a close to my column.  With Thomas Fraser’s return as Editor in 2020, the parent company initiated an electronic version with a vigorous publication schedule. Fraser has published several of my articles in the electronic version.
This is a slightly different version of one review with an afterword, including a link to an online biography and comments on selected publications. 
Vintage Lopez by Barry Lopez
"What being a naturalist has come to mean to me, sitting my mornings and evenings by the river, hearing the clack of herons through the creak of swallows over the screams of osprey under the purl of fox sparrows, so far removed from White and Darwin and Leopold and even Carson is this: Pay attention to the mystery. Apprentice to the best apprentices. Rediscover in nature your biology. Write and speak with an appreciation for all you have been gifted. Recognize that a politics with no biology, or a politics with no field biology, or a political platform in which human biological requirements form but one plank, is a vision of the gates of Hell."
This final paragraph of "The Naturalist," an essay originally published in Orion magazine, sums up the writings of Barry Lopez. It finalizes one of the many works reprinted in Vintage Lopez, a literary retrospective including chapters and excerpts from several previous books. Many of the books are collections of works previously published in periodicals. "The Naturalist" is the only one of these works not previously published in a book.
Lamentably, Vintage Lopez does not include any material from Of Wolves and Men, the nonfiction book that brought this notable author to my attention. That book popularized Barry Lopez as a writer and laid the groundwork for the quick acceptance of his later writing. He recounted what he learned, accompanying wolf researchers on expeditions in the field.

Vintage Lopez includes the opening chapter from Arctic Dreams, the 1986 National Book Award winner, and other honors. He published Arctic Dreams after traveling with scientists in Alaska and Northern Canada. It summarized their field studies of the native peoples of those lands but also included comments on the natural world in the far north.
Vintage Lopez is the fifteenth book authored by Lopez. It is an excellent place to start for those just exploring his works.
Afterword
Barry Lopez died on Christmas Day, 2020, after publishing Horizon, a long nonfiction work that summed up his travels and his purpose in writing. I have a copy of Horizon but have yet to read it. It is daunting in length, but I also read knowing there will be no more works by one of my favorite authors. His website includes a biography and links to some final essays as they appeared in magazines.
More works by Barry Lopez
In his book of essays, Crossing Open Ground, he encourages readers to rediscover their sense of wonder. In one of them, he searches for a prehistoric stone image of a horse, which he calls an intaglio.
About this Life is a book of essays. My favorite is “Learning to See,” which was included in Vintage Lopez.
River Notes: Reflections in the Eye of a Raven/Desert Notes: The Dance of Herons includes two short fiction books previously published separately. Although I think of Lopez as a nonfiction writer, his works of fiction are excellent. He published several others.
Crow and Weasel is an illustrated story about two young men who decide to travel further north than anyone has gone before. They meet people previously unknown to their village and return with stories. It fits Joseph Campbell’s archetype called the hero’s journey.
Lopez published several articles and essays in Orion Magazine.  A search of their website will yield a list.

I photographed the bug on a southern magnolia earlier this decade and the following images of a small turtle that same day.