{"id":3117,"date":"2013-08-30T10:00:24","date_gmt":"2013-08-30T14:00:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bsuenglish.wordpress.com\/?p=3117"},"modified":"2013-08-30T10:00:24","modified_gmt":"2013-08-30T14:00:24","slug":"sean-lovelace-recommends-coming-into-the-country-by-john-mcphee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bsu.edu\/english\/blog\/2013\/08\/30\/sean-lovelace-recommends-coming-into-the-country-by-john-mcphee\/","title":{"rendered":"Sean Lovelace Recommends “Coming into the Country” by John McPhee"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the latest installment of our Recommended Reads series Professor Sean Lovelace recommends <\/i>Coming into the Country by John McPhee<\/i><\/a>.<\/i><\/i><\/p>\n

Author John McPhee is a technician, from the micro to the macro. He is a meticulous architect, with a keen emphasis on structure, but he\u2019s the type of designer that bends the boundaries, a Frank Lloyd Wright, even more a Zaha Hadid, or a Gehry. McPhee once wrote an entire book about oranges, using the fruit itself\u2014from seeds to flesh to unraveling rind\u2014as his structure. He later wrote an essay on Atlantic City; using a Monopoly board as his scaffolding (the streets and railroads of Monopoly are actually located in New Jersey). So I recommend the nonfiction text, Coming<\/i> Into the Country<\/i>, not only for its majestic subject (Alaska), but for its technical mastery.<\/p>\n

McPhee divides Alaska into three sections, using geography as his structural cue. The first section is titled, \u201cThe Northern Tree Line,\u201d and explores the truly wild (as in unpopulated by humans) rivers (McPhee is an avid canoeist and tends to find his way onto the water for most of his books) that meander below the Arctic Circle, the Brooks Range. The second section is \u201cIn Urban Alaska,\u201d an examination of Anchorage, Juneau, and all of the nasty, political machinations behind the sudden influence of oil, oil money, and a 1974 debate on relocating the capital (It remains in Juneau, as we know). The final section, \u201cIn the Bush,\u201d conjures up the mythical Alaska, the Yukon, gold fever, sled dogs, Eskimos, an Alaska we are supposed to recognize (though, of course, we know little to nothing).<\/p>\n

Good technique serves a purpose. A chef might have excellent knife skills, yet what does it matter if the food tastes badly? McPhee\u2019s structure always serves its end. The geography of Alaska elicits the themes of the \u201ccountry.\u201d (Yes, it is a state, but, believe me, it\u2019s a country to its own.) The section on the Brooks Range underlines that 99% of Alaskans don\u2019t interact with the wilderness much at all. They can\u2019t afford the air travel and air travel is pretty much the only game in town. The urban chapter crushes our mystique concerning Alaska as a special place. Government squabbling is human: petty, selfish, banal, and anything but romantic. The last section shows us the Yukon, yes, but what is the Yukon? Not Jack London. The Yukon is three things: 1. A rough group of society\u2019s outsiders who want to be left entirely alone. 2. Native Americans, often exploited. 3. The United States government, meddling relentlessly with the affairs of everyone. In a word, the Yukon is messy. McPhee\u2019s structure divides Alaska into units, but these segments are thematic. Like any skillful artist, his form delivers its function.<\/p>\n

In the micro, McPhee employs a great number of creative techniques. In the interest of brevity, I\u2019ll mention two: crisp and vibrant figurative language, and listing.<\/p>\n

Of salmon holding in the current: \u201cLooking over the side of the canoe is like staring down into a sky full of zeppelins.\u201d Later, \u201cThe water was waist deep, cold as a wine bucket.\u201d And \u201cThe boat was lumpy, awkward, bulging\u2014a kayak with elbows.\u201d And of trees: \u201cMost of the spruce in this country look like pipe cleaners. The better ones look like bottle washers.\u201d The weather is described as \u201c\u2026a front as dank as an oyster.\u201d And so on. As you can imagine, Alaska offers bountiful opportunities for such a perceptive eye, and McPhee seems to enjoy himself with his detail and descriptions, and why not?<\/p>\n

Listing. What do the river people of the Yukon talk about? \u201c\u2026in loops without end about hunting, fishing, trapping, and dogs; knives, axes, the kerf-width of saws; mortises, tenons; steel-cut oats; oars, poles; sleds, toboggans; aluminum boats; trail sets, visuals, tracks on the pan; single trees, spreaders; the collar of stoves; what sort of pups a certain bitch might throw; shelter, clothing, death, and marten bait (grouse wings versus salmon skins versus strawberry jam); and as the talk curved through its long ellipses it turned and returned, as always, to the Yukon, to every gravel bar, rock, rip, eddy, and bend\u2014free or under ice.\u201d These lists go on, throughout. But look at Alaska. Look at how things (like ice) accumulate. Look at what people bring and take away. The lists are appropriate to the setting.<\/p>\n

I could go on (and on), but hopefully my point is made. Sure, Coming into the Country<\/i> is about Alaska in a certain time (the 1970s), and you\u2019ll learn all you want to know about its flora, fauna, and people, steadily, intricately; but this book is also a technical manual on writing. McPhee has the eye of a geologist, a botanist, a biologist, most certainly a sociologist, but, in the end, he is an adroit expert of the word.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

McPhee, John.\u00a0Coming into the Country<\/em>. New York:\u00a0Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1991. Print.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the latest installment of our Recommended Reads series Professor Sean Lovelace recommends Coming into the Country by John McPhee. Author John McPhee is a technician, from the micro to the macro. 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