Subtitled Essays from the Outside, this is a collection of essays about hiking deserts and floating rivers.
The book contains the essay A walk in the desert hills, which those who are interested in the mechanics of literature can compare with the rough notes Ed made in his journal during the trip, published in Confessions of a Barbarian. It gives an informative and entertaining lesson in Abbey's note-to-essay method.
No passport needed, no examinations to undergo, no special equipment required, no experience necessary. A journey into Edward Abbey's wilderness is the freest, cheapest, most non-privileged of pleasures.
In this wise and lyrical book about landscapes of the desert and the mind, the author of Desert Solitaire, Down the River, and The Monkey Wrench Gang, guides us beyond the wall of the city and asphalt belting of superhighways to special pockets of wilderness that stretch from the interior of Alaska to the dry lands of Mexico.
"Abbey has always had a special authenticity and independence and confident tone, compared to those of his contemporaries who also write and like to stick their heads out-of-doors occasionally. Like Thoreau, he is at times ornery and subversive in thrust, to good purposes as a rule. And Abbey, like Thoreau, is undeterred by the taste-makers of his own day, a man still `with the bark on'."
-- Edward Hoagland
Abbey, Edward, 1927- Beyond the wall : essays from the outside / Edward Abbey. 1st ed. New York : Holt, Rinehart and Winston, c1984. xvii, 203 p. ; 22 cm. LC CALL NUMBER: F595.2 .A23 1984 SUBJECTS: Abbey, Edward, 1927- Deserts--West (U.S.) West (U.S.)--Description and travel. DEWEY DEC: 917.8/0433 dc19 ISBN: 0030692997 : $14.95 0030693012 (pbk.) GEOG. AREA CODE: n-usp-- LCCN: 83-18346 r942