Wilderness Philosophy

It's Jake's birthday. He is sitting in a small plane, being flown over the landscape that has been the backdrop to his life - his childhood, his marriage, his work, his passions. Now he is in his early sixties, and he isn't quite the man he used to be. He has lost his wife, his son is in prison, and he is about to lose his past, for Jake has Alzheimer's.

When her emotionally-abusive ex flees the country to escape arrest for blackmailing other politicians, it’s actually a relief—a chance to reclaim her life. But retreating to the mountain house gifted by her mother, she’s met by hostility from the nearby town. The locals blame Erin for her ex’s corrupt actions that led to the construction of a private prison, drawing gangs, violence, and death.

Shattered by the discovery of her husband's affair, Liv knows they need to leave the chaos of New York to save their marriage. Maybe the road trip they'd always planned, exploring America's national parks - just the two of them - would help heal the wounds.

In this engaging audio edition, find out why Wilderness Essays is the top-selling book by John Muir. Wilderness Essays is an essential collection of the finest essays ever written by the “Father of the National Parks.” An ardent outdoorsman, a gifted writer, a dedicated preservationist, and a spiritual beacon, John Muir conveys here the boundless love and wonder of the natural world that drove his critically important work.

While much recent ecocriticism has questioned the value of nature as a concept, Thought's Wilderness insists that it is analytically and politically indispensable, and that romanticism shows us why. Without a concept of nature, Greg Ellermann argues, our thinking is limited to the world that capitalism has made. Defamiliarizing the tradition of romantic nature writing, Ellermann contends that the romantics tried to circumvent the domination of nature that is essential to modern capitalism.