Forests
The Shadow of Civilization
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Word Count
76,000 words, Guess
Page Count
304 pages
Physical Format
Paperback
Identifiers
- Internet Archiveforestsshadowofc0000harr
- ISBN-100226318079
- ISBN-139780226318073
- LibraryThing8486291
- Goodreads1063562
and 3 more
- OCLC Control Number48869841
- Better World Books9780226318073
- Open LibraryOL9381760M
Classifications
- LCCPN56.F64H37 1993
- LCCPN56 F64 H37 1993
Description
"As Western civilization cleared its space in the midst of the forests, it projected into the sylvan darkness its secret and innermost anxieties; in the forest's shadow we find enchantment, terror, and irony. In this wide-ranging exploration of the role of forests in Western thought, Robert Pogue Harrison enriches our understanding not only of the forest's place in the cultural imagination of the West, but also of the ecological dilemmas that now confront us so urgently." "Harrison offers a richly detailed account of how the governing institutions of the West--from religion to law, family to city--established themselves in opposition to the forests, where the distinctions of civilization go astray. In sources ranging from Gilgamesh and the myths of ancient Greece and Rome to twentieth-century writers like Conrad, Sartre, and Beckett, Harrison finds the forest to be an enigma and paradox: a place of lawlessness, yet a haven for the unjustly treated; a place of profanity yet sacred ground; a world of darkness and obscurity, yet a stage for revelation." "The word forest derives from the Latin for outside. Harrison comes to terms with the radical nature of this outsidedness and the way it grounds human life on the earth. What, he asks, does it mean to "be at home" while estranged from the physical world in which we dwell?" "Consistently insightful and beautifully written, this work is especially compelling at a time when the forest, as a source of wonder, respect, and meaning, disappears daily from the earth."--Jacket.
First Sentence
IT IS NOT ONLY IN THE MODERN IMAGINATION THAT FORests cast their shadow of primeval antiquity; from the beginning they appeared to our ancestors as archaic, as antecedent to the human world.
Subjects
Topics
Other Editions
- Forests
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