Green Shingles: At the Edge of Chesapeake Bay [Hardcover]

Peter Svenson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1999

Peter Svenson begins his elegant, idiosyncratic exploration of the Chesapeake Bay at the doorstep of his own home--a green shingled house perched high on Mitchell's Bluff, looking out across the Bay's busy shipping lanes toward the western shore. Svenson invites us to explore various aspects of the world outside his door, from the bayside community in which he lives to the Chesapeake's complex and fragile ecosystem. He gives us an insider's look at the arcane art of canoe sailing, the exigencies of landscape painting, and life aboard the sturdy tugboats that travel up and down the long bay. A thoughtful meditation on the intersection of the human and natural worlds, Green Shingles offers a unique look at America's largest estuary from one of the region's finest writers.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"There is much here that will interest readers hereabouts, for the Chesapeake Bay is a place about which many of us dream and which a few of us are privileged enough to have made home... Svenson sees his environmentalism through a clear eye, one that appreciates not merely natural wonders but human accomplishments." -- Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post

"Peter Svenson's rigorously detailed recollections... are so rich in fact and so powerfully constructed as to make high adventure of something as seemingly mundane as a shift on a Coast Guard buoy tender. Svenson has the eye of an artist obsessed with detail and the curiosity of a reporter enraptured by the who, what, when, where, why, and how of just about anything. And it's all under one roof in Green Shingles." -- J. Taylor Buckley, USA Today

"Fascinating... Svenson skillfully uses his artist's eye to describe the ever-changing panoramas unfolding from Mitchell's Bluff -- the colors of the sky and water, the lure of weather and wind current." -- Susan Q. Stranahan, Baltimore Sun

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"A courageous book welding natural history and fast-paced landscape change in a glimmer as bright as the Bay." -- John StilgoeHarvard University, author of Outside Lies the Magic

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 195 pages
• Publisher: Faber & Faber; 1st edition (January 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0571199615
• ISBN-13: 978-0571199617
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.9 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,739,292 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An Outsider Discovers the Eastern Shore, January 18, 2002

By 

Anne K. Gartland (Potomac, MD USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Green Shingles: At the Edge of Chesapeake Bay (Hardcover)

I liked this book. Because of its cover, first. Because of its writing, second. And because of its humor. Mr. Svenson takes himself seriously--as he should, being a Master of Fine Arts (MFA). But he lets his hair down when he describes what it took for him and his wife (at midlife) to buy their green-shingled house on a bluff overlooking the Bay.
A lot of money, garnered from relatives. A lot of cleaning up...trash that pleasure boaters continued to throw toward his beach, and a rebuff by the art-league when someone hid an oil painting rather than display it.
Mr. Svenson's voice is his alone. Put a dictionary close as you read. Stand near the window as he examines the morning's boat traffic going by. Envy him and his wife (why didn't he name her, "Katherine," instead of referring her as K?).
It's a personal narrative that makes the skipjacks-and-oysters books on the Bay only the beginning. Here, under a green-shingled roof, is life-in-the moment. I thought I knew Chestertown, Centerville, and Rock Hall, the area the author writes about, but I know it much better now, through his eyes.

5.0 out of 5 stars Worthy of the Bluff, February 11, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Green Shingles: At the Edge of Chesapeake Bay (Paperback)

This is an excellent portrayal of life from the bluff of the eastern shore of the Chesapeake. Mr. Svenson's observations are a fascinating read for anyone who loves the bay and the Eastern Shore. The stories of the workmen who were to build his garage and his "2nd Place" in the art show are classics. Be aware Mr. Svenson does come off rather pompous in his reflections. Also, in spite of all the detail Svenson gets into, he still somehow mislabels local towns and there county jurisdictions (Kent County, MD is just not that hard). Hopefully he is finally happy and at peace with himself on the bluff.

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Original, Articulate Tapestry of a Place, July 11, 2002

By 

C. Ebeling "ctlpareader" (PA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Green Shingles: At the Edge of Chesapeake Bay (Paperback)

In middle age, Peter Svenson and his wife, K, have moved to Maryland from the Virginia farm that was the setting of Svenson's acclaimed book, BATTLEFIELD. They decide to make a bold leap, in terms of economics and lifestyle, and buy a house on the windy Tolchester bluff on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay. The title, GREEN SHINGLES, is derived from the house's distinctive roof. In graceful prose marked by a distinctive, articulate voice, Svenson by turns examines the natural science, maritime events, and public works that connect with his existence on that bluff, the beach 40 feet below it and, of course, the water.

If you are turning to this book having just finished BATTLEFIELD, you should know that once again, Svenson does a bang up job of coaxing the history out of a place; he does thorough research and interprets it in compelling terms. This time, he also visits on tugs and a coast guard buoy patrol, profiling the tasks and life aboard the boats in the bay. You will find the pace of this book more languid, and in some instances the author more self absorbed in a curmudgeonly way. He takes time out to relate a homeowner's contractor from hell story and his skirmish with a local art show, the latter a provincial bruising it seems to his MFA trained sensibilities. This is indeed a different book from that first, but in the end, Svenson again delivers a fine, original performance that is a pleasure to read. You put it down convinced he is, after all, right about a lot of things.