The Wildest Country: A Guide to Thoreau's Maine

Huber, J. Parker

Sports & Outdoors

UNKNO

Compiled from John Muir’s journal entries, letters, and hundreds of additional sources, this resource presents a detailed examination of Muir’s travels throughout New Englandfrom the mountains of Maine to the halls of Harvard University. With comprehensive insights into Muir’s wanderings, this unique reference discusses the beginnings of the environmental movement as well as how 19th century New England literary society evolved. This distinctive look at Muir showcases how he was just as much shaped by the cultural landscapes of the East as he was by the pathless expanses of the West.

A Wanderer All My Days: John Muir in New England

Science & Math

Nature & Ecology

Green Frigate Books

In Infinite Good: The Mountains of William James, author and naturalist, J. Parker Huber, follows the famed naturalist and philosopher William James sojourns in New England. The Adirondacks―where neither Muir nor Thoreau tread―James revealed, had the greatest influence on his life. He made annual pilgrimages there in late nineteenth century. He bought land there, as well as a farm at the south base of Mount Chocorua in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, which became his country home. Drawing on James’s faithfully recorded itineraries, author J. Parker Huber provides comprehensive and well-documented summaries about the excursions of William James and his family. William James became increasingly aware of nature’s beneficence. In 1872, then thirty, he confided to Henry in two letters what he had drawn from his Maine coast experiences that summer. In the first, of 24 August, he wrote that the “nervouspuckers” of his mind had been “smoothed out gently & fairly by the sweet influences of many a lie on a hill top at mt. Desert with sky & sea & Islands before me, by many a row, and a couple of sails, and by my bath and siesta on the blazing sand this morn.” And, again in the fall of 1872, he wrote that he had “never so much as this summer felt the soothing and hygienic effects of nature upon the human spirit.” Earlier his enjoyment of nature had been a “luxury, but this time t’was as a vital food, or medicine.” And so it remained for his life.J Parker Huber provides a fascinating look at the prominent philosopher’s love of the mountains and the solace he found there. Readers will appreciate the scholarly research, but also participate in the alpinist’s adventures and revelations.

Infinite Good: The Mountains of William James

Biographies & Memoirs

Historical

Green Writers Press

Back in print by popular demand, this fully updated and revised edition of The Wildest Country: A Guide to Thoreau’s Maine follows the famed naturalist Henry David Thoreau’s sojourns in Maine and offers modern commentary on how the route has changed. Drawing on Thoreau’s faithfully recorded itineraries in his classic book The Maine Woods, author J. Parker Huber provides comprehensive color maps and summaries of Thoreau’s travels. Huber artfully organizes these excursions into one grand tour of Maine’s most impressive scenery. From Moosehead Lake to Katahdin, returning to Bangor down the Penobscot River, today’s traveler can trace these routes for an hour, a day, or several weeks. 
Throughout, The Wildest Country is illuminated with Thoreau’s distinctive observations of his natural surroundings and his fellow man: his delight in the illusive laughing loons; his sampling of indigenous tea substitutes; and his pact with Indian guide Joe Polis to exchange every bit of knowledge each possessed—within 11 days.
This beautiful edition, illustrated with beautiful color and historic black-and-white photographs, is the perfect choice to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the publication of The Maine Woods, first published in Boston in 1864.

The Wildest Country: Exploring Thoreau's Maine

Literature & Fiction

History & Criticism

Appalachian Mountain Club Books

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Books by Huber, J. Parker