[pct-l] The Backpacker's Bookshelf

>Date: Wed, 27 Dec 2000 15:47:15 EST
>From: TOKTAADN@aol.com
>Subject: Re: [pct-l] Re: pct-l-digest V1 #1359
>
>In a message dated 12/27/2000 2:41:22 PM Eastern Standard Time,
>Dusybasin@aol.com writes:
>
><< " One, or some ( or up to 5 ) of my favorite books on backpacking,
>mountain
>  travel, outdoor life, conservation, alternate lifestyle...( the general
>  category ) " : >>
>
>Not in any particular order:
>
>Anything by Thoreau
>Anything by Muir
>Anything by Edward Abbey
>Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard
>Ten Million Steps by Nimblewill Nomad
>
>(Hoping that Jim and Ginny write a future favorite)  :)
>
>Happy trails,
>
>Solar Bear
>* From the PCT-L |  Need help? http://www.backcountry.net/faq.html  *
>
I'll heartily second the first three (Thoreau, Muir, Abbey)!  Myself, I'd 
probably rank them in that order.  I'm not familiar with the others but I'll 
have to remedy that.  From poetry, I'd add:  Wordsworth.

On "alternative lifestyles" -- The Good Life by the Nearings.  Beautiful!  
Both inspiring and instructive.

Though it doesn't really fit into any of the categories you asked about, I 
could recommend Merton's Thoughts in Solitude, which I read on my hike of 
the JMT this past summer.  I go through periods of alternating coolness and 
warmth towards Merton; this summer was one of the warm ones.  It's hard for 
a hiker moving alone through the Sierras not to feel some resonance with a 
passage like this -- "The desert was created simply to be itself, not to be 
transformed by men into something else.  So too the mountain and the sea.  
The desert is therefore the logical dwelling place for the man who seeks to 
be nothing but himself--that is to say, a creature solitary and poor and 
dependent upon no one but God, with no great project standing between 
himself and his Creator."
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==============================================================================
To:            Rachel Berrington <rb300@teleport.com>
Cc:            pct-l@backcountry.net