Legacy of D'Arcy McNickle: Writer, Historian, Activist (American Indian Literature & Critical Studies) [Hardcover]

John L. Purdy (Editor)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 264 pages
• Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press (April 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0806128062
• ISBN-13: 978-0806128061
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,820,541 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

For information about the author, please visit at:

www.johnpurdy.net

I was born and raised in Oregon. My great-grandfather and grand-mother homesteaded there in 1872, so in a way the novel Riding Shotgun into the Promised Land is concerned with how the present has been shaped by the past and various immigrants. Also, one grandfather came to Oregon via California from up-state New York, and to fund his travels up from Sacramento (an ironic name in this case) he founded "God's Religious Army." Holding tent meetings along the route, he relied "upon the kindness of strangers." However, near Grants Pass his wife died, and this is where he met and married my grandmother. So, I am also interested in the ways that fortune brings families together, tears them apart, and then reconstitutes new families out of the old: the past in the present again.

I am also a Vietnam veteran and curious about the ways military experiences a long way from home work their ways into our society, for good or for ill.

Under all these interests and curiosities, though, is a deep concern about the future of our environment, which has borne the brunt of the transplanted ideologies our ancestors brought with them as they immigrated here looking for "The Promised Land." How, I would ask, can we avoid the damage done by short-term desires meeting an ecosystem based upon stability and change that takes place over long periods of time?