What is particularly striking about the selections in this anthology, especially the early essays, is Shepard's prescience in anticipating research and practice in art and ecology, cultural landscape studies, tourism studies, the body, environmental history, and the general concern for the intersection between the physical landscape and material world and the realm of ideas. -- Kenneth Helphand * from the foreword * Watching Shepard struggle to separate ideas about nature from the natural worldand, in the process, trace out the intricate connections between themis enlightening. His essays are so erudite, his sources so wide-ranging, that it is impossible not to read these essays and see old problems in new ways. -- Environmental History Every encounter with Paul Shepard's work challenges those of us who would envision sustainable lifeways to remember that the general good is the plea of the liar, the hypocrite, the scoundrel. The general good is Utopia, no place. -- Resurgence Shepard's intellect was wide-ranging and his writing is strong, as this collection proves. His influence on the American environmental movement was an important one. -- Virginia Quarterly Review
