Nature Writings: The Story of My Boyhood and Youth / My First Summer in the Sierra / The Mountains of California / Stickeen / Essays

by John Muir, William Cronon

In a lifetime of exploration, writing, and passionate political activism, John Muir became America’s most eloquent spokesman for the mystery and majesty of the wilderness. A crucial figure in the creation of our national parks system and a far-seeing prophet of environmental awareness who founded the Sierra Club in 1892, he was also a master of natural description who evoked with unique power and intimacy the untrammeled landscapes of the American West. The Library of America’s Nature Writings collects his most significant and best-loved works in a single volume.

The Story of My Boyhood and Youth (1913) is Muir’s memoir of growing up by the sea in Scotland, of coming to America with his family at age eleven, and of his early fascination with the natural world. My First Summer in the Sierra (1911) is his famous account of the spiritual awakening he experienced when, in 1869, he first encountered the mountains and valleys of central California, of which he wrote: “Bathed in such beauty, watching the expressions ever varying on the faces of the mountains, watching the stars, which here have a glory that the lowlander never dreams of, watching the circling seasons, listening to the songs of the waters and winds and birds, would be endless pleasure…. No other place has ever so overwhelmingly attracted me as this hospitable, Godful wilderness.”

The natural history classic The Mountains of California (1894) draws on half a lifetime of exploration of the High Sierra country to celebrate and evoke the region’s lakes, forests, flowers, and animals, its glaciers, storms, floods, and geological formations, in a masterpiece of observation and poetic description: “After ten years spent in the heart of it … it still seems to me above all others the Range of Light, the most divinely beautiful of all the mountain-chains I have ever seen.”

Stickeen (1909), Muir’s most popular book, is the affectionate story of his adventure with a dog in Alaska. Rounding out the volume is a rich selection of essays—including “Yosemite Glaciers,” “God’s First Temples,” “Snow-Storm on Mount Shasta,” “The American Forests,” and the late appeal “Save the Redwoods”—highlighting various aspects of his career: his exploration of the Grand Canyon and of what became Yosemite and Yellowstone national parks, his successful crusades to preserve the wilderness, his early walking tour to Florida, and the Alaska journey of 1879.

Genres: Nature, Nonfiction, Essays, Travel, Environment, Outdoors, Memoir

928 pages, Hardcover

First published April 22, 1997

About the author

John Muir was far more than a naturalist; he was a secular prophet who translated the rugged language of the wilderness into a spiritual calling that saved the American soul from total surrender to materialism. Born in 1838 in the coastal town of Dunbar, Scotland, Muir’s childhood was a blend of seaside wanderings and a brutal religious upbringing. His father, Daniel Muir, was a man of uncompromising faith who forced John to memorize the New Testament and most of the Old Testament by age eleven. When the family immigrated to the frontier of Wisconsin in 1849, this iron-fisted discipline continued on their farm. However, for the young Muir, the "Book of Nature" began to rival the Bible. He saw the divine not just in scripture, but in the black locust trees and the sun-drenched meadows of the midwest.
The pivotal moment of Muir’s life occurred in 1867 while working at a wagon wheel factory in Indianapolis. A tool slipped, piercing his cornea and leaving him temporarily blind in both eyes. Confined to a darkened room for six weeks, Muir faced the terrifying prospect of a life without light. When his sight miraculously returned, he emerged with a clarity of purpose that would change the course of American history. He famously wrote, "This affliction has driven me to the sweet fields. God has to nearly kill us sometimes, to teach us lessons." He immediately set out on a 1,000-mile walk to the Gulf of Mexico, beginning a lifelong odyssey of exploration.
Muir eventually found his "true home" in California’s Sierra Nevada. To Muir, the mountains were not mere piles of rock, but "the range of light." He spent years as a shepherd and guide in Yosemite, living a life of extreme simplicity—often traveling with nothing but a tin cup, a crust of bread, and a volume of Emerson’s essays. His scientific contributions were equally profound; he defied the leading geologists of the day by proving that the Yosemite Valley was carved by ancient glaciers. While the state geologist, Josiah Whitney, dismissed him as a mere "shepherd," the world’s leading glaciologists eventually recognized Muir’s genius.
His transition from explorer to activist was born of necessity. Seeing the "hoofed locusts"—domestic sheep—devouring the high mountain meadows, Muir took up his pen. His landmark articles in The Century Magazine and his 1903 camping trip with President Theodore Roosevelt became the catalysts for the modern conservation movement. Under the stars at Glacier Point, Muir convinced the President that the wilderness required federal protection. This meeting laid the groundwork for the expansion of the National Park system and the eventual return of Yosemite Valley to federal control.
As the co-founder and first president of the Sierra Club, Muir spent his final years in a fierce philosophical battle with Gifford Pinchot. While Pinchot argued for "conservation" (the sustainable use of resources), Muir championed "preservation" (the protection of nature for its own sake). Though he lost the battle to save the Hetch Hetchy Valley from being dammed, the heartbreak of that loss galvanized the American public, ensuring that future "cathedrals of nature" would remain inviolate. John Muir died in 1914, but his voice remains ubiquitous, reminding us that "into the woods we go, to lose our minds and find our souls."

Reviews

[Barrett Brassfield · Rating 5 out of 5]

Essential in every respect. Instead of vacation bible schools where we indoctrinate kids with writings and contradictory practices built upon a foundation of supernatural codswallop there should be vacation John Muir schools. Our species would advance farther and quicker over time than ever before.

[Megan · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you enjoy Thoreau you are in for a real delight as Muir describes the sublime Sierra Mountain range, dwelling lovingly on his surroundings. There's much to digest in his writings, many thoughtful ideas about the relationships between man and nature, man and religion, and religion and nature. These books are a feast for spring and summer days.

Unfortunately, I withhold the full adoration that some reviewers have placed on him. Muir holds a view about nature that I dislike, which is that it exists to be his playground / backdrop to get in touch with himself. He revels in the beauty around him and his heart tells him he was uniquely meant to stand there, as anyone's heart would at the top of Yosemite Falls, but this comes at a cost. He mentions several interactions with local Indian tribes, uses their trails "otherwise I never would have found my way!" trades with them when he's low on supplies, etc.--and yet he does not connect that he is in someone's home. To him, the wilderness around him is "pure," "untouched," and "virgin" (said way more times than necessary).

It's not the first time an "adventurer" loves a beautiful place while being dismissive of the locals, but I found his attitude off-putting: "Occasionally a good countenance may be seen among the Mono Indians, but these, the first specimens I had seen, were mostly ugly, and some of them altogether hideous [...] Somehow they seemed to have no right place in the landscape, and I was glad to see them fading out of sight down the pass" (373, emphasis mine). Muir sees nature as his personal "escape" from impure civilization, and it continues to unsettle him when he interacts with Indians in their ordinary day-to-day activities. There's a disconnect--he can't envision the mountains as someone's home and as an already lived-in and modified environment. This awkward reality spoils his visions of purification and renewal, and so he ignores it.

I don't want to be too hard on these books, because the writing really is beautiful. I can tell he labored over these manuscripts to get them just right. But our contemporary understandings of nature and conservation were shaped by men like John Muir, who was influential in creating the national parks, but who also contributed to the expulsion of many tribes from their homelands by refusing to accept that people already lived in the places he was "protecting." Because he was influential in his time, his attitude and claims ought to be treated with scrutiny. So, I would take this book on a paragraph-by-paragraph basis, enjoying his descriptions but not getting too carried away with his romanticism.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this before I went backpacking in the Minarets and rock climbing in Yosemite in 1999. Great book. Took big to put in the backpack though. How did he function on less than 4 hours of sleep a night. And he'd go hiking with some bread and cheese, and that's all. I looked at my 70+ lb backpack with all my modern, technical gear. He was oil cloth and wool and he was fine. What was wrong with me? He didn't need ropes and "pro" when climbing mountains. Why did I need it? How things have changed since J Muir was alive.

[Mandy E · Rating 5 out of 5]

Notes:
•the extraordinary shaking loose of conventional prose and movement toward a freer expression when Muir begins to write of what birdsong means to him
•Muir the whimsical inventor of hand chiseled mechanisms
•on the retention of innocence, the ability to be joyful, to be freshly delighted again and again
•Muir the supplicant to wilderness
•constant disappointment in humanity
•Muir spending the night on top of a mossy "flood boulder" set in the middle of the stream "like an altar," overhung with dogwood and alder and sprayed by the falls nearby (My First Summer in the Sierra)

[James Junke · Rating 5 out of 5]

A truly remarkable story, well told, often in elegiac prose. A incredibly monastic mountaineer, a combination of his closest friends in the wilderness, the Douglas squirrel, the water ouzel and the mountain sheep. His climbing a very tall silver fir in the middle of a winter gale epitomized his love of nature and his zest for life. Amazing that he did not perish from cold, hunger, an avalanche or fire. Physically and mentally tough, certainly in part the result of overcoming the cruelty of his father who treated him like slave labour as boy on their Wisconsin farm. An apparently happy loner, yet some of his most memorable writings are about his infrequent encounters with his fellow man observed with wry, but caustic wit. Except for his deep respect for Emerson for whom he guided in Yosemite. Plus his memorable story about his canine sidekick Stikeen. His descriptions of clouds in the high Sierra and their intimate relationship with the mountains was uniquely insightful. An environmental trailblazer, not a fan of hoofed locusts (sheep), miners, settlers or sawmills. Admiration for the First Nations people he met in his wandering, largely free of racism. A shame that camera technology was in its infancy as to have photos to accompany his writing would have been magical. Something Ansel Adams did much to correct, inspired by Muir. A highly intelligent, deeply read, profoundly curious person who reminded me of Isaacson’s characterization of da Vinci. Evidently shy, married late in life but happily and a devoted father who struggled between parenting and the call of the wild. A long read, but worth it.

[Chava]

I love John Muir's breathtaking experiences of the Divine in Nature. He discovered that, "going out was really going in." (rough paraphrase). Reading Muir is like discovering a whole new prayer book; one that immediately engages you in real world experience; seeing yourself as part of one huge, magical, web of life.

[Andrew Means · Rating 4 out of 5]

John Muir, first president of the Sierra Club, towers over environmentalism like a dominant peak in his beloved Sierra Nevada range. If, to many of us, he has become a remote and lofty monument, this 824-page anthology (entitled “Nature Writings,” and originally published in this form in 1997 by The Library of America) should breathe vitality and insight into his legacy.
Beginning with a memoir of childhood in Scotland and Wisconsin—the family’s home after emigration, the selected accounts herein abruptly transition to Muir’s love affair with the mountains of California, his subsequent adventures in Alaska, and even expeditions to Arizona’s Grand Canyon and Florida’s Cedar Keys.
Though I cannot claim expertise in the work of 19th Century naturalists, I find it hard to believe that any writer, then or subsequently, has matched Muir in the delight he showed in every one of Nature’s facets. From the microcosms of flower petals and ice drops to vast spectacles of storm and landscape, Muir reveled in his surroundings. He prized virtually every life form he encounters, referring with anthropomorphic glee to “plant people” and “insect people.”
Be warned, some chapters are so resplendent with botanical and geological detail, it may be best for the casual reader to skip to items of more general interest. For instance, there is his celebrated tale of an Alaskan adventure with a dog named Stickeen as a companion. Many a pet lover over the years must have tensed at their travails as they negotiated glacial crevasses.
As his perspective as a writer changes over the years, Muir transitions from memoir to field guide to travelogue. With the threat to wilderness from development more apparent in the early years of the 20th century, Muir becomes a tourism advocate in his campaigning for public lands and a public willingness to support them. A major feature in that respect was his famed and failed attempt to prevent the Hetch Hetchy Valley from becoming a reservoir for San Francisco, and predictably he dwells increasingly on desecration for the sake of development.
Throughout, one can never stop admiring Muir’s encyclopedic knowledge—although, as previously noted, I’ll leave it to the others to judge the accuracy of his observations. What cannot be contested is his dedication to preserving the essence of the areas in which he traveled, and for that matter the eloquence in his writing. As a founder of the Sierra Club, his mission continues—as does the pressing need for it.
For those mystified about how Muir acquired his knowledge, and indeed what took him from Wisconsin to California, the book ends with textual notes and a detailed chronology. This timeline is a valuable addition, providing details about his itinerant domestic and international travels, marriage and two daughters, influences on his thinking, celebrity status and meetings with political and cultural figures of note, not to mention his birth in 1838 and death in 1914.
A Postscript:
In reading Muir’s account of his first venture into the Sierra Nevada range, I was taken aback to learn that he considered the indigenous people he encountered to be dirty and by inference inferior to “civilized” beings. I must admit that I initially put that to one side in writing this review. But recent news that the Sierra Club hierarchy is reflecting negatively on Muir’s purported views of racial differences has me re-thinking too. My opinion, for what its worth, is that the current re-calibration of cultural attitudes in general is overdue. But I also note that the famous are more susceptible to revisionism, however justified, than those who transgress in anonymity.
As far as I recall, Muir’s comments about indigenous people are muted in this book and he has no aspersions for other races, even if his friendships apparently suggest otherwise. It is tempting to dismiss his errant views as those of a man of his time. But we are people of our time, and must re-assess accordingly.
The point subject to debate is that perhaps his observations of people’s appearance were accurate—as his observations typically were I believe in the botanical and geological fields. Perhaps those indigenous persons he encountered in the Sierras were dirty and gave a bad impression. On the other hand, it also prompts the consideration that Muir’s words in this case were filtered through prejudice.
It should be kept in mind too that not all Muir’s impressions of indigenous people, as expressed in these pages, were uncomplimentary. On a visit to Arizona’s Grand Canyon, later in his life, he regarded its inhabitants as “able, erect men, with commanding eyes.”
The golden rule, it seems to me, must be that one bases impressions of personality and habits on the individuals observed rather than the groups to which they appear to belong. And in addition, one must consider that norms and standards differ according to tradition and circumstances beyond one’s own. A person of any race or group may be viewed negatively, and one should be able to express that judgment without being regarded as condemning by association their entire group, religion, nationality or race.
In hindsight particularly, it’s hard to separate observation from prejudice. And of course, large as this volume is, there is plenty about John Muir that lies outside its parameters.

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe it's because every other book I was reading had to do with war or politics. There's inherent drama in war and politics. Where there are more than two people in any given situation there is bound to be conflict. But f**k if it doesn't wear one down after awhile.

That's when it's time to escape to the forests with John Muir. Hardly a mention of man is made in this entire 700-something page collection except for some essays about the author's youth in Scotland and some very general observation about tourists and Native Americans. I won't lie and say that trees make the most interesting topics, or that the 100th description of a sugar pine isn't wearying in its own way. But some of Muir's prose is just beautiful, period. You want to read it out loud, let it roll over your tongue, and save it for future inspiration.

Perhaps this is the closest I will ever come to reading a bible. One man's bible wherein he finds enlightenment through communing with nature. He says of the religious (Christians), "Now it never seems to occur to these far-seeing teachers that Nature's object in making animals and plants might possibly be first of all the happiness of each one of them, not the creation of all for the happiness of one. ...The universe would be incomplete without man; but it would also be incomplete without the smallest transmicroscopic creature that dwells beyond our conceitful eyes and knowledge."

Like the Buddha (and probably Jesus) I'm sure this prophet found it just as hard to get his fellow man (who is understandably more concerned with food, shelter, employment, profit--that is war and politics) to see the world as he saw it. But he certainly tried in the essays and journals he left behind.

[Billy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read the following essays in this volume: "My Boyhood and Youth," Stickeen," and "Alaska." I've also read some parts of The Mountains of California in a separate volume. Best for me is "Stickeen," a wonderful dog story that takes place on an Alaskan glacier. "My Boyhood and Youth" is another great read, especially the parts about settling the Wisconsin frontier in the 1840s and 50s. Muir arrived from Scotland in 1849 as an 11-year old. Put to endless toil as the family farm was built, his love of nature shines through the hardships. Muir's mechanical skills and inventions are another aspect of his genius.

[Bill Sleeman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loaned to me by a friend – this collection of Muir’s writings (Nature Writings: The Story of My Boyhood and Youth / My First Summer in the Sierra / The Mountains of California / Stickeen / Essays ) was a laborious but interesting read. Muir, probably the quintessential nature writer of the late 19th and early 20th centuries is at his best when describing some particular event (a snowstorm on Mt. Shasta; a bear attack on a sheep herd) and less so when expressing his personal connection to something or someplace. These efforts, while certainly heartfelt, reflect a 19th century style that – for this reader – was just too cumbersome.

Much has been said and written about John Muir’s dislike of indigenous people and that is certainly on display throughout this collection of writings (kudos to the editors at the Library of America for not trying to finesse this but instead presenting Muir’s words just as they are). John Muir’s disdain for the people and tribes he encounters is palpable and while it does not seem to manifest as hatred so much as total disregard, it is nevertheless striking. Not to justify it but again, a very typical 19th century – white person’s worldview of nature.

John Muir remains a central figure in the creation of the modern conservation movement and this Library of America edition is an excellent entry into his writings and his beliefs. The collection offers much to anyone who wants to try to understand Muir and his role in the creation of the environmental movement in America.

[William Schram · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nature Writings by John Muir is a collection of writings by John Muir. From discussing his childhood in Scotland to moving to the United States and being in Wisconsin for a time, Muir was a man enamored with the Natural World and its wonders. With a keen eye and a skill for drawing, Muir was a founder of the Sierra Club and did his best to introduce others to the beauty of nature. So this collection includes The Story of My Boyhood and Youth, My First Summer in the Sierra, The Mountains of California, Stickeen, and several Essays. With a charming mien and a panoply of visual delights in the form of drawings, this book is quite delightful.

Some of the parts read a bit like a travelogue diary. I assume he merely published portions of his private diary for these books. It really works too. I wonder if it is possible to trace his course through the Sierra and other places. That might be interesting to do.

Since John Muir lived in Wisconsin for a time, I thought it would be interesting to read up on him and I wasn’t disappointed. The man lived a full life is all I can say.

[Terry · Rating 4 out of 5]

We were out in the Sequoia National Park a couple of weeks ago, and maybe it was because we walked in the Muir Woods, and to the Muir Grove, and not far from the John Muir Trail, which crosses the John Muir Wilderness. John Muir this, John Muir that, everywhere you go.

So I picked up the Library of America anthology of his nature writings, and read the first two books in it, "The Story of My Boyhood and Youth" and "My First Summer in the Sierra."

There's a lot of botany in it--he was a botany major at what became the University of Wisconsin. The purple prose and anthropomorphism are a little off-putting these days, but there's enough narration to keep it interesting for a reader like me.

I'm going to put it aside after the summer in the Sierra, and save "The Mountains of California" for another season.

[Cheri]

Didn't finish, but hope to get back to this. More interesting than the nature writings to me was the story of his life. Favorite quote of his:

Hiking - I don't like either the word or the thing. People ought to saunter in the mountains - not hike! Do you know the origin of that word 'saunter?' It's a beautiful word. Away back in the Middle Ages people used to go on pilgrimages to the Holy Land, and when people in the villages through which they passed asked where they were going, they would reply, "A la sainte terre,' 'To the Holy Land.' And so they became known as sainte-terre-ers or saunterers. Now these mountains are our Holy Land, and we ought to saunter through them reverently, not 'hike' through them."

[Jenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this collection I’ve read
My Boyhood and Youth
My First Summer in the Sierras
Stickeen

Muir was an amazing man. He had little formal education but was interested in everything and read a great deal. He taught himself advanced mathematics and clockwork so that he was able to invent and build accurate clocks and devices from wood he whittled from scrap. His prose is simple but poetic and his love and wonder for nature clearly take his breath away. Muir speaks of animals and plants as people and closely observes their habits and patterns. Stickeen is an incredible short story of daring and dedication told with seemingly no hint of knowledge that this adventure was an extraordinary example of his own will, bravery and big heartedness.

[Your Common House Bat · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was long but by God it was worth every minute of reading. Muir has such amazingly lush prose and the tone of his writing is both soothing and informative. It definitely instills a primitive wanderlust in a reader. I was able to pick out so many quotes from this one that I had to write down. I'd definitely like to read more by this man. Honestly I now have an answer to the "if you could meet any dead celebrity or historic figure who would it be" question. Muir just seem like such an insightful man and his works all reflect this imo.

[Mont · Rating 4 out of 5]

The National Parks came into being in large part due to the efforts of a Scottish immigrant. Sierra Club-founder John Muir’s spiritual dispatches from Yosemite and the Sierra Nevada (and camping trips with the wealthy and powerful) brought eastward the magnificence of the ranges and sites threatened by westward-creeping industry, agriculture, and development, giving the preservationist movement the extra oomph it needed to bring about the founding of the National Parks.

[Whiskey Tango]

The National Parks came into being in large part due to the efforts of a Scottish immigrant. Sierra Club founder John Muir’s spiritual dispatches from Yosemite and the Sierra Nevada (and camping trips with the wealthy and powerful) brought eastward the magnificence of the ranges and sites threatened by westward-creeping industry, agriculture, and development, giving the preservationist movement the extra oomph it needed to bring about the founding of the National Parks.

[Jeff Mohr · Rating 3 out of 5]

This collection of Muir’s writings left me at once both in awe and deeply disturbed. How can one write so brilliantly and explicitly about the wonders of nature and the limitations of man, but at the same time have absolutely no appreciation for the first inhabitants who walked turtle Island and are still here?

[Barbara Mauceri · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an amazing read! I am saddened by the fact it is over

Every page was better than the next. Although Muir was not a literary genius, his words are full of life and meaning.

[Doris Raines · Rating 5 out of 5]

WALKING IS JUST LIKE A BREATH OF FRESH AIR.

[Julie Barrett · Rating 5 out of 5]

x read

[Myst · Rating 2 out of 5]

Seems poignant until you find out about Muir’s problematic views and treatment of Native people…maybe not a great poster child for environmental conservation and all things good

[T.Kay Browning · Rating 4 out of 5]

it was good, I will always despise it

[Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wish there were more Alaska writings and the 1000 mile journey. Muir is a fantastic writer, his depictions of nature as an extension of god is really beautiful

[Richard Needham · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a New American Library collection of John Muir’s writings: born in Scotland in 1838, raised on a farm in Wisconsin, educated as a botanist, and transformed by his encounters with nature in the American West, particularly Yosemite and the Sierras. He thirsted for knowledge in his younger days, and invented an apparatus to push him out of bed at 1 AM so he could study to supplement his basic schooling before the heavy labor of farm work in the mid 1800’s (“The Story of My Boyhood and Youth”). “My First Summer in the Sierras”, where he accompanied a sheepherder seems to have been a spiritual awakening, and he wrote beautifully and movingly of his discoveries of forest and meadow, animals and rocks, and the stunning vistas of the Sierras, as well as the destruction of habitat that the sheep caused. Muir was a gifted writer as well as an advocate: he saw nature as not something to be endured, or conquered, but to be embraced and respected, and his essays seems as fresh and moving today as when they were written in the 19th and early 20th century. In one essay in “The Mountains of California” he tells of a fierce windstorm that came up when camping near Yosemite: rather than seek shelter, he climbed to the top of the tallest tree he could find and rode out the storm as it lashed and swayed the trees in a sort of glorious ecstasy. One of his most popular stories is “Stickeen” telling of his experiences (one almost unbearably tense) with a small dog in Alaska. Although his first love was the Sierra Mountains (biographical notes tell of a visit to Yosemite by President Theodore Roosevelt, who ignored his schedule, eluded his entourage and went camping alone with Muir in the wilderness for 3 days), he also wrote of the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone, source of one of his most famous quotes: “Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees…”…well, you can Google the rest for a taste of the beauty of his writing. This is a wonderful collection of writings by one who contributed enormously to the protection of the western wilderness.

[Teri Stich · Rating 5 out of 5]

John Muir, naturalist and one of the founders of the Sierra Club, was a truly exceptional person. His intellect and curiousity seemed to be without limit. I was quite aware of his intensive travel especially throughout the Sierra Neveda and Alaska, what I found interesting was his many inventions including Barometers, Thermometers, and Clocks. While he is rather wordy (I think he out words Michener!!) and it was slow going, if you are at all interested in Nature, Botany, and the exploration of our great county his work is a must read.

[Chris Cooper · Rating 2 out of 5]

I love Muir's enthusiasm about nature, this why I grabbed this book before I went to Yosemite Valley. But Muir's writing is pretty dry & boring. I tried reading "My First Summer in the Sierra," but just couldn't stick with it. I have admiration for Mr. Muir, but I don't plan on trying to read anymore of his works.

[Megan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wish I could have finished it but three weeks on loan from the local library just wasn't enough for this mammoth of a book. What I did read though was beautiful and made me long to wander through the mountains.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

Muir's writing was much better than I anticipated. Lyrical and poetic about nature without being purple, he took me along on great adventures making keen observations throughout about the Sierras. Muir brought along as a connoisseur of our great California mountains.

[Michael Cummings · Rating 5 out of 5]

I stumbled on this book completely by accident, and feel all the better for doing so. Large parts of the text were written a century or more ago, yet Muir's writing resonates with a modernity and freshness that made this book a joy and a pleasure.