The Land of Little Rain - Softcover

Austin, Mary

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1595406794 ISBN 13: 9781595406798

Publisher: 1st World Library - Literary Society, 2004

Synopsis

Purchase one of 1st World Library's Classic Books and help support our free internet library of downloadable eBooks. Visit us online at www.1stWorldLibrary.ORG - - I confess to a great liking for the Indian fashion of name-giving: every man known by that phrase which best expresses him to whoso names him. Thus he may be Mighty-Hunter, or Man-Afraid-of-a-Bear, accor-ding as he is called by friend or enemy, and Scar-Face to those who knew him by the eye's grasp only. No other fashion, I think, sets so well with the various natures that inhabit in us, and if you agree with me you will understand why so few names are written here as they appear in the geography. For if I love a lake known by the name of the man who discovered it, which endears itself by reason of the close-locked pines it nourishes about its borders, you may look in my account to find it so described. But if the Indians have been there before me, you shall have their name, which is always beautifully fit and does not originate in the poor human desire for perpetuity. Nevertheless there are certain peaks, caņons, and clear meadow spaces which are above all compassing of words, and have a certain fame as of the nobly great to whom we give no familiar names. Guided by these you may reach my country and find or not find, according as it lieth in you, much that is set down here. And more. The earth is no wanton to give up all her best to every comer, but keeps a sweet, separate intimacy for each.

About this title

From the Inside Flap:

"Between the high Sierras south from Yosemite--east and south over a very great assemblage of broken ranges beyond Death Valley, and on illimitably into the Mojave Desert" is the territory that Mary Austin calls the Land of Little Rain. In this classic collection of meditations on the wonders of this region, Austin generously shares "such news of the land, of its trails and what is astir in them, as one lover of it can give to another." Her vivid writings capture the landscape--from burnt hills to sun-baked mesas--as well as the rich variety of plant and animal life, and the few human beings who inhabit the land, including cattlemen, miners, and Paiute Indians. This Modern Library Paperback Classic is set from the original 1903 edition.

About the Author:

Novelist and essayist who wrote about Native American culture and their social problems. Mary Austin is the author of nearly thirty books and hundreds of short works that drew from her impressions of the indigenous people.

About this edition

• Publisher: 1st World Library - Literary Society
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 1595406794
• ISBN 13: 9781595406798
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 132
• Editor: 1stworld Library