The Control of Nature

Description

Author: McPhee, John  (1931-)

Publisher: Farrar Strauss Giroux (New York)

Pub Date: 1989

Binding: Hardcover

Condition:  Book: Fair.  Binding tight.  No marks, tears, folds.  Upper corner pages 67-68 has an approx. 1/16″ x 1/4″ bend, and pages 69-70 has a small chip, both caused by bumping.  Lower rear corner slightly worn.  Dust Jacket: Fair.  NOT price clipped.  Lower rear cover corner missing an approx. 1/8″ chip.  Edge wear to all edges.

Notes: Hubris, pure and simple, is McPhee’s idea here–humans think they can control nature.  As if.  Four essays, the longest on attempting to control the Mississippi River through channelization and levees to protect New Orleans and Baton Rouge, essays on volcanoes in Iceland and Hawaii and what humans are trying to do to control, or at least mitigate, their effects, and an essay on the geology of Los Angeles, whose mountains are disintegrating and the populations living beneath them.  One of my favorite McPhee’s.