My Boyhood With A Conclusion By His Son Julian Burroughs

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"You ask me to give you some account of my life - how it was with me, and now in my seventy-sixth year I find myself in the mood to do so... It is mainly the life of a country man and a rather obscure man of letters, lived in eventful times indeed, but largely lived apart from the men and events that have given character to the last three quarters of a century. Like tens of thousands of others, I have been a spectator of...the activities - political, commercial, sociological, scientific - of the times in which I have lived. My life, like your own, has been along the by-paths rather than along the great public highways. I have known but few great men and have played no part in any great public events - not even in the Civil War which I lived through and in which my duty plainly called me to take part. I am a man who recoils from noise and strife, even from fair competition, and who likes to see his days...by some quiet, congenial occupation."

At the time of his death in 1921, John Burroughs (1837-1921) was America’s most beloved nature writer, a best-selling author whose friends and admirers included Walt Whitman, Theodore Roosevelt, John Muir, Henry Ford, and Thomas Edison. Burroughs was second only to Emerson in fostering the nature study movement of the nineteenth- century, and the popularity of his work inspired Houghton Mifflin to publish or reissue the work of numerous other nature writers, including that of Thoreau and Muir. His first collection of essays, Wake-Robin, was published in 1871, and over the next fifty years Burroughs wrote almost two dozen books, and hundreds of essays—not only on nature, but on literature, travel, philosophy, religion, and science. By the turn of the century, Burroughs was America’s most beloved nature writer, whose friends and admirers included Walt Whitman, Theodore Roosevelt, John Muir, Henry Ford, and Thomas Edison. Burroughs died in 1921 while on a train ride back to his New York from California. His final words—"Are we home yet?"—were a remarkably fitting coda to the career of a writer so closely identified with his native Catskill region of New York State. In many of his essays, Burroughs explores the woods and fields of home, and in doing so, like Henry Thoreau and his explorations of Concord, Massachusetts, he transcends the local and examines the universal theme of our relation with nature and our native landscape. Burroughs’s emphasis on "place" and the local now seems modern once again; as the current interest in bioregionalism and climate change demonstrates, it has become increasingly evident that "thinking locally" is "thinking globally." Since 1992, the SUNY College at Oneonta has hosted the biannual John Burroughs Nature Conference and Seminar ('Sharp Eyes'), which honors the influence of Burroughs on American nature writing. Distinguished keynote speakers who have addressed the conference include John Elder, John Tallmadge, Joy Harjo, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Edward Kanze, James Perrin Warren, and Edward J. Renehan, Jr. The scope of the conference is not limited solely to Burroughs, however, as each year the writers and scholars in attendance direct their attention toward a particular issue of significance to contemporary nature writers and scholars of environmental literature. The theme of this collection, "Writing the Land: John Burroughs and his Legacy" was featured in the 2006 conference, and includes essays on John Burroughs as well as essays on the work of other writers who, like Burroughs, are linked closely through their work to a particular landscape or region. The third and final section of this book features invited essays by three distinguished scholars, John Tallmadge, Robert Beuka, and Charlotte Zoë Walker, who consider the topic of what writing about the land and nature means from three different perspectives—urban, suburban, and rural.

A collection of essays by noted naturalist John Burroughs in which he contemplates a wide array of topics including farming, religion, and conservation. A departure from previous John Burroughs anthologies, this volume celebrates the surprising range of his writing to include religion, philosophy, conservation, and farming. In doing so, it emphasizes the process of the literary naturalist, specifically the lively connection the author makes between perceiving nature and how perception permeates all aspects of life experiences

John Burroughs, the genial and tremendously popular author of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, has gained renewed appreciation at the end of the twentieth century. His quiet approach to nature writing—a combination of scientific observation and poetic spirit, has informed generations of readers. This book is a testament to the importance of his work in modern literature. In addition to exploring the historical aspects of Burroughs's life and character, these works illuminate his role as a writer and his relationships with such contemporaries as Whitman, Thoreau, Emerson, and Muir. Frank Bergan discusses Burroughs as environmentalist, Bill McKibben writes on Burroughs and the call of the "not so wild," Daniel Payne expounds on Burroughs's religion of nature, Wendell Berry considers the sacred economy of homesteading, and Ralph Black provides an analysis on Burroughs and the poetics of the nature essay. This book will have special appeal to those interested in nature writing, American literature, and environmental and cultural history of New York State. A section on the history and current use of Burroughs's work in the classroom also makes the book a valuable resource for teachers.