Wilderness of Hope
Wilderness is a fantasy of human desires born of a false binary of wild nature without people. But imagining wilderness might deliver us to a new geography of hope.
Do National Parks Have a Role in an Agrarian Future?
A few years ago I listened in on a conversation with poet, novelist, and essayist Wendell Berry, introduced that day as “without question the leading agrarian of our time.” He suggested a definition of this term agrarian as a “love for farming” that includes an inclination to put land first as our highest value. “Access to land,” Berry surmised, “provides…
Why do we have national parks?
In his affectionate review of author Michael Frome’s corpus of writings about national parks, Alfred Runte asks, “Why do we have national parks?” Runte summarizes Frome’s insistent answer: “Because every generation deserves to have them. They are not for the economy; they are rather for the soul of the country. They are all about keeping our tomorrows whole.” In Frome’s…