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Edwin Muir was born in a small island community at the end of the last century. From his sheltered childhood in rural Orkney to the turmoil of industrial Glasgow at the turn of the century, Muir offers a startling vision of Scotland and the creative process during an era of unprecedented change. Witness to the most traumatic years and events of our modern age, Edwin Muir, in his life as in his art, was haunted by the symbolic "fable" which he longed to find beneath the surface "story" of mere events. From his dream notebooks to his travels in Eastern Europe, Muir paints an unforgettable picture of the slow and sometimes painful growth of a poet's sensibility as he comes to terms with his own nature amidst the terror and confusion of the 20th century. A peronal memoir by George Mackay Brown is also included. ... Read more

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Great travel writing, silly and ill-informed politics.
Edwin Muir, Scottish Journey (Mainstream Publishing, 1935)

Edwin Muir is a pretty good writer, when he sticks to travelogues and abstract philosophy. He doesn't do so in Scottish Journey, though one would think so from the first hundred pages. Scottish Journey is meant as (and was commissioned as) a travelogue, and for the most part, Muir sticks to the template. He writes well of the Scots countryside, and passably of Edinburgh, slipping in bits of philosophy here and there, as is to be expected in any good travelogue. As well, Muir is an extremely quotable writer; his words are clear and precise, and draw excellent pictures in the reader's mind.

Muir was, however, an ardent Socialist of the closed-minded sort, as much as he professes otherwise. This affects the book in his long chapter on Glasgow, which he starts with a screed against Industrialism (he always capitalizes the word, I might as well, too) and capitalism. Humorously, he attempts to say that Industrialism, in and of itself, isn't all that bad. He does so in a paragraph that spans almost two and a half pages. The first and last few sentences are of the opinion that Industrialism isn't all that bad. It's the middle hundred or so sentences that shoot the argument in the foot, as he catalogs a list of the horrors he sees in Glasgow. One wonders how it's possible to write all these things and frame them with "it's not bad." It would be kind of like a pagan writing the same of the Inquisition, from the evils that Muir ascribes to Industrialism.

What's worse, he can't see the forest for the trees. In one breath, he talks about ho a capitalist system can't take population contraction into account; in the next, he's talking about unemployment. And he sees no correlation between the two, or at least none he's willing to admit. At one point, perhaps the book's nadir, he says, while discussing the rise of the Scottish Nationalist party, "....If such devotion and fidelity are not to be admired, then all our ideas of morality are mistaken." Leaving it as it is, he infers that no such thing could possibly be true. Yet not five pages later, at the beginning of his chapter on the Highlands, he has little good to say about the morality of a people who are so embarrassed by the twin hills known as the Paps of Jura, one of Scotland's biggest tourist draws at the time, that he couldn't find a postcard that showed them clearly anywhere in the town. One is tempted to see the inconsistencies as a (sub?)conscious undercutting of Muir's own arguments, but nothing else in the book points to it; the man's to solid and straightforward a writer to resort to such tricks.

Overall, though, it's worth checking out for the travel writing and the easy read. Just take his political outlook with a grain of salt. ** ½

One of the most thoughtful travel books ever written
Muir combines vivid descriptions of people and scenes with passionatediscussions of socialism, unemployment, and the spiritual poverty of theScottish people in the 30's. Truly a political poet's book ... Read more

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the distilled passage of a man through time
I'm trying to construct a situation whereby a person would be browsing in Amazon's world of words and stumble across an edition of Edwin Muir's poetry without prior knowledge of the poet or his work.No "Listmanias" link to this book (perhaps I'll change that, eventually).There aren't any recommendations for alternate purchases, which leads me to believe that no other purchases would suggest this book as another possibility for the interested.In fact, if you read this review, you probably know more about Edwin Muir than I do.Nevertheless, for what it's worth:

Persevere through the first section: his early poems.Things start happening in "Variations on a Time Theme."Sections 7 and 10 of that one are phenomenal.Continue and you'll find a poet obsessed with the symbols and themes of Christianity, mythology, time, and loss.T. S. Eliot in the introduction calls him and Edwin Muir contemporaries doing different things, yet Muir converted Eliot to be a fan and editor, and no wonder--in Muir's ruminations on Time I thought persistently and inevitably of the Four Quartets.Muir's language is lovely yet accessible, just the right amount of formal hyjinks and symbols that leave a sweet and full-bodied aftertaste (only a poet who knows history can do this).I've been sitting with a lion and a dragon since the morning. ... Read more

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Among the greatest poets of the twentieth century
Edwin Muir is probably better remembered now as the translator of Kafka than as a writer in his own right; but he was a poet of extraordinary range, depth, elegance, and skill, and his poems are among the glories of English language poetry in the twentieth century. ... Read more

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During John Muir's extraordinary life as a conservationist, he traveled through most of the American wilderness alone and on foot, without a gun or a sleeping bag. In 1903, while on a three-day camping trip with President Theodore Roosevelt, he convinced the president of the importance of a national conservation program, and he is given major credit for saving the Grand Canyon and Arizona's Petrified Forest. Muir's writing, based on journals he kept throughout his life, gives our generation a picture of an America still wild and unsettled only one hundred years ago. Edwin Way Teale has collected here the best of Muir's writing, selected from all of his major works, including MY FIRST SUMMER IN THE SIERRA and TRAVELS IN ALASKA. THE WILDERNESS WORLD OF JOHN MUIR provides "reading that is often magnificent, thrilling, exciting, breathtaking, and awe-inspiring" (Kirkus Reviews). ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

quiet book about a lively man
This is a book that let's Muir speak yet the small inserts by the author who hand-picked the Muir passages add so much to the reading. Muir was a unique person to be sure - the accounts by people who met him were of a person boisterous, talkative, enthusiastic yet his writings, though enthusiastic, are slightly matter of fact-just in the way he writes, not necessarily the content.

John Muir -- Pioneer Wilderness Writer
A wonderful sampling of Muir's writings and his timeless perspective on the wonders of our natural world.

A Wind Storm in the Forest,
excerpted from Muir's The Mountains of California, is one chapter I've read many times. He climbs to the top of a Doug Fir so that he can experience a 100' tree swaying 30° back and forth "rocking and swirling in wild ecstasy" I take this book backpacking (there's no ultralight version yet...) in the Sierra most times and there's always something to read that fits the setting. EWT's intro is very sweet as are the

Great for nature lovers!
I really enjoyed this book as it was focused on plants and animals.My favorite chapters were "The Water Ouzel" (a bird) and "Stickeen" (a dog).However, the whole book was interesting and enjoyable, including chapters about different people he met along the way ("The Robber" and "The Blacksmith").This book is titled as "a selection from his collected work."I enjoyed his writing so much that I will look for a complete volume of his works so I don't miss out on any other great stories.

Very Best Starting Point to Learn AboutJohn Muir
I am often asked for a recommendation of what among Muir's writings, or writings about him, one should first read. After spending more than 30 years appreciating both his writings and most of the books about Muir that have been published during that time, and after ten years editing the John Muir Exhibit online, I can only turn to the same book that originally enthalled me with John Muir: The Wilderness World of John Muir, edited by Edwin Way Teale.

This book was edited by someone who was himself an able naturalist and nature-writer, and therefore someone who could understand Muir in a way that most academics, whether professors of literature or historians, cannot. Edwin Way Teale (1899-1980), has been ranked as a nature writer with been ranked with Henry David Thoreau, John Burroughs, as well as John Muir himself. His honors include being elected as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, receiving the John Burroughs Award in 1943, and the Pulitzer Prize in 1966. He was the author of 32 books. Teale's sympathy for Muir's message is shown in the book's Dedication page, which is "Dedicated to The Sierra Club, The Wilderness Society, The National Parks Association, and all those who are fighting the good fight to preserve what John Muir sought to save."

This book serves as both an anthology of the very best of Muir's writings, and also a biography, compellingly provided by Teale.

The biographical value of this work is often under-stated, even by the publisher. The book is typically viewed as an anthology, and indeed it is, primarily; but it also contains a wealth of biographical information, far more than the typical anthology.

Teale commences his book on John Muir with an authoritative 10-page Introduction, that not merely identifies the key events in Muir's life, but provides an assessment and perspective of how Muir stacks up with other nature writers. He provides facts you won't find elsewhere: "While visiting friends, Muir sometimes would talk four hours at breakfast." Teale, writing in 1954, was able to talk with several people who knew Muir personally. He noted that everyone he talked to had a different view of which phase of natural history held first importance in Muir's mind. Some thought it was trees; another thought it was geology, another plants. Teale points out the fourth view, probably the nearest right of all: "... the whole interrelationships of life, the complete rounded picture of the mountain world. Today, Muir probably would be called an ecologist." Teale 's assessment of Muir as an "ecologist" pre-dates the "ecology movement" of the 1970s by at least 15 years. Teale admirably tells of the scope of the places, glaciers, plants, and animals named after him, and Muir's contributions to science and conservation. Although public appreciation for Muir has grown dramatically since Teale's book was first published in 1954, The Wilderness World of John Muir still provides the best introduction to Muir's life and writings.

Following the admirable Introduction, each of the 51 excerpts from Muir's writings commences with a preface by Teale, of up to a page in length, presenting in chronological order the story of Muir's life, and putting each of Muir's writings into context.

Although serving as a biography, the Wilderness World is, in fact, primarily a superb anthology. Rather than simply re-printing the full text of such of Muir's works as The Story of My Boyhood and Youth, A Thousand-Mile Walk to the Gulf, My First Summer in the Sierra, Travels in Alaska, Our National Parks , and the Journals, Teale provides short snippets from the best of Muir's writings, arranged into seven broad categories:

I. Memories of Youth - reprints Muir's writings about his boyhood in Scotland, life on the Wisconsin Farm, seeing immense flocks Passenger Pigeons, nearly dying of choke-damp while digging a well, his inventions, and his enrollment at the University of Wisconsin.

II. University of The Wilderness - Excerpts from A Thousand Mile Walk, including people by the way, camping among the tombs of Bonaventure Cemetery in Savannah, Georgia, and Muir's visit to Cuba and New York.

III. The Range of Light - Muir's adventures in the Sierra, including his first glimpse from Pacheco Pass and crossing the bee pastures of the Central Valley, his first visits to the High Sierra, climbing on the brink of Yosemite Falls above the Valley, tributes to wildlife including bears and grasshoppers, and his telepathic experience sensing the presence of his former University Professor Butler in the Valley.

IV. The Valley - Muir's glorious tributes to Yosemite Valley's waterfalls, the water ouzel, the earthquake, and Ralph Waldo Emerson's visit.

V. Forests of the West - Including Muir's adventure high atop a Douglas fir during a wind-storm, and writings about Silver Pine, the Douglas Squirrel, Sequoia, Nevada Nut Pines, and Muir's clarion call to protect the forests, "Any Fool Can Destroy a Tree."

VI. Glacier Pioneer - Muir's discovery of the Sierra glaciers, his climb of Mount Ritter, his perilous night on Mount Shasta, and his travels in Alaska, including his discovery of Glacier Bay and his adventure with Stickeen.

VII. The Philosophy of John Muir - excerpts from many scattered sources focusing on Muir's views on mankind's relationship to Nature. For many, this is the favorite part of the book, the part one returns to again and again for inspiration.

Despite this, the book does have some failings. The book belies the importance of Muir's family and friends, which becomes so evident upon reading his extensive correspondence. Nor does the book do more than barely mention some important places in Muir's life, such as his global travels to such places as the glacial mountains of Europe, the forests of Siberia, the Himalayas and forests of India, Australian and New Zealand forests, and, the fulfillment of his life-long dream, his last trip to see the forests of South America and Africa. The book emphasizes Muir's appreciative writings about Nature, and only briefly mentions the conservation battles which consumed so much of his life, including his long campaign to protect Hetch Hetchy. To obtain a whole picture of Muir, the reader will need to also read another work about Muir's conservation campaigns, such as Roderick Nash's chapter on "John Muir: Publicizer" in Wilderness and the American Mind, Stephen Fox's John Muir and His Legacy: The American Conservation Movement, or John Muir and the Sierra Club: The Battle for Yosemite by Holway R. Jones.

Since the book was originally published in 1954, it is not informed by some of the more recent research resulting from Muir's unpublished journals and correspondence, published in the John Muir Papers in 1980. Given the popularity of this book, fifty years after its first publication, the publishers should consider a second edition, again using a nature writer rather than a literary critic or historian to update the book.

Overall, in this book Muir comes alive, as someone who can can at once write inspiringly and poetically about trees, storms, mountains, glaciers, and forests, but yet also show the attention to detail of an analytical scientist. Muir is revealed as adventurer, a lover of nature, a person who can still excite the imagination of readers. As Teale concludes, "Rich in time, rich in enjoyment, rich in appreciation, rich in enthusiasm, rich in understanding, rich in expression, rich in friends, rich in knowledge, John muir lived a full and rounded life, a life unique in many ways, admirable in many ways, valuable in many ways.... In his writings and in his conservation achievements, Muir seems especially present in a world that is better because he lived here."

August, 2004 ... Read more

Product Description
Born on the Orkney island of Wyre in 1887, Edwin Muir settled in various parts of Europe during the first half of the twentieth century - from Glasgow, to Austria and Czechoslovakia throughout to 1920s, 1930s and again after the war. Muir's poetry bears oblique witness to the most traumatic years and events of this century, and is haunted by the symbolic 'fable' which he longed to find beneath the surface 'story' of mere events, as he came to terms with his own nature amidst the terror and confusion of the European maelstrom. As Seamus Heaney has written: 'Muir's poetic strength revealed itself in being able to co-ordinate the nightmare of history with that place in himself where he had trembled with anticipation...His simultaneous at-homeness and abroadness is exemplary.' ... Read more

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Hoy and Mellown provide a bibliography of articles,reviews, books, chapters of books, and unpublished dissertations thatfocus on the works of Edwin Muir. ... Read more

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Over a period of 90 days, Robin Gillanders journeyed throughout the Highlands of Scotland and Orkney in the spirit of Edwin Muir's Scottish Journey of 1934, photographing whoever and whatever he encountered. The journey was made in a campervan with the shower converted into a darkroom, so that film processing could take place 'on the road'. In the manner of itinerant photographers of the 19th and 20th centuries, he used a traditional large format camera and black and white film, the photographs, each with accompanying text, describe the journey and relate to specific issues facing the highlands today and draw comparison with Edwin Muir's highlands of 75 years ago. Edwin Muir became particularly interested in the nature of Scottish 'identity' during his journey and his descriptions have become an important historical resource for the economic, political and social condition of Scotland between the world wars. As with Muir in 1934, it was not Gillanders' intention to present an image of the 'tourist' Highlands, but rather to present an honest, and subjective account of what he encountered. This is a fascinating and beautifully illustrated account of contemporary life in the Scottish Highlands and is set to become as important a record as Edwin Muir's venerated work. ... Read more

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Much more than your average coffee-table book
Robin Gillanders' "Highland Journey:In the Spirit of Edwin Muir," is much more than your average coffee-table photo book.

The boldness of this work lies almost as much in what Gillanders is not doing as in what he is doing.What he is not doing is "tourist" Scotland, "historic" Scotland, "the castles of Scotland" or a work of the type that conforms to images of Scotland often found in the minds of Americans, Canadians, etc., many of whom may be descendants of Scottish emigres.There are many other books, especially travel narratives and photography-focused works that do just that. Scotland and the Scottish people of stereotype often hearken back to 19th century views of a romanticized Scotland based on 100+ year-old stereotypes.

Instead, what Gillanders does is portray modern Scots in their home environment often doing their job or living their lives just as they do.The use of a large-format camera and the medium of black-and-white photography add a formal and documentarian imprimatur to his collection.

Make no mistake, however, these are modern photographs. Gillanders owes a debt of gratitude to to Edwin Muir, whom he credits, whose 1934 journey to Scotland documented the period between the two World Wars.While not exactly replicating Muir's journey, Gillanders visits many of the same places that Muir visited on his celebrated journey.

Gillander's considered and pithy captions (one or two paragraphs), explain each photograph and provide a unifying context to the collection.

This is a thoughful and considered album, a work you will go back to many times. ... Read more

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"Edwin Muir the man, his autobiography, and his poetry are inseparably one, for which the world is the richer."Chad Walsh, Beloit College ... Read more