Magpie Rising : Sketches from the Great Plains
Overview
The rolling, billowing, delicate landscape of Nebraska's Sandhills; the tombstone of Billy the Kid--stolen so often that it must be caged and shackled--in Fort Sumner, New Mexico; an intercontinental ballistic missile trundling down a highway under heavy guard in Weld County, Colorado; cottonwoods and cranes, faded hotels and abandoned trailers painted aqua and purple; the ghosts of Pawnees, Cheyennes, and Kiowas and generations of settlers whose descendants now grouse in a café in Heimdahl, North Dakota, or roar off to a bikers convention in Sturgis, South Dakota. These are some of the things that catch Merrill Gilfillan's eye and ear in this radiant collection of essays. Written with a poetic economy that often attains grandeur, Magpie Rising is an exhilarating tour of the Great Plains--its geography, wildlife, history, mythology, and food, its vast spaces and weirdly synchronous time. This is nature writing at its most evocative and insightful.
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Details
- ISBN-13: 9780803271074
- ISBN-10: 0803271077
- Publisher: Bison Books
- Publish Date: March 2003
- Dimensions: 8.02 x 5.38 x 0.43 inches
- Shipping Weight: 0.49 pounds
- Page Count: 194
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