In The Walk, William deBuys writes about personal loss and the power of the landscape to nurture the recovery of hope. The book consists of three interrelated essays that move from a period of strife in the author’s life to a kind of limbo and eventually to a place of peace. The setting is deBuys’ small farm in New Mexico’s Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Each morning, he takes the same walk through the woods, arriving, as he describes in the first essay, at a clarity that comes from looking at the same vantage point for years. The middle essay, “Geranium,” takes its name from a mare deBuys had to put down, and whose remains become one with the forest. In the final essay, deBuys reflects on drought, the loss of a friend, and the resurgence of land and hope. Contemplative, compassionate, and quietly humorous, The Walk is nature writing at its finest.
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Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Author and professor deBuys has been repeating the same journey "up one arroyo, down another, back by the river...and up through the farm," every day for the past 27 years. In chronicling that daily walk and the contemplation it stirs, deBuys (River of Traps) has created another eloquent document of life in the mountain valleys of New Mexico. Bringing the Southwestern countryside to brilliant life, deBuys provides history of the wildlife that roam it, the inhabitants who claimed it and the current residents deBuys lives among, as well as more personal stories like the end of his long marriage and his friend's death from lung cancer. Each walk is a play between solitude and communion that "lubricates the connections of thought" and leads to unexpected insights: "The walk is like a piece of music that I partly play and partly listen to...still trying to understand my part and how to play it." As he ponders, mountain peaks become prayers, forests become dreams and the whole of it becomes an unfolding mystery that deBuys scours for signs of meaning, hope and the elusive connection between mankind and the wilderness around them: "The landscape abounds with flaws, like those who walk it." Anyone who enjoys a saunter in the great outdoors will find this memoir brimming with rich pleasures.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Booklist
These days the meditative art of nature writing is often overshadowed by works of environmental concern and warning. Therefore, what bliss it is to encounter deBuys' beautifully crafted musings on the history and spirit of land he has long walked and cherished. On a small farm in northern New Mexico, deBuys has married, raised children, cared lovingly for horses, and learned the ways of water and earth, grass and elk. He has also studied evidence of the errors of our ways in the "testimony of the landscape." DeBuys contemplates the follies of pesticide use and wildfire policies, and takes measure of his painful solitude after the demise of his marriage and the death of friends. What is there to do, but to walk the land as he has for 27 years? After all, "walking helps the mind go out and the world come in, and brings us to our senses." A supple and silvery book, The Walk defines hope in terms of mountain and sky, river and pine, mindfulness and love. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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More About the Author
William deBuys's books include River of Traps (reissued in 2008), which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1991. An excerpt from The Walk, which is set in the same mountain valley as River of Traps, won a 2008 Pushcart Prize. He was a 2008-2009 Guggenheim Fellow and spent his fellowship year working on "A Great Aridness: Climate Change in the North American Southwest." Long active in environmental matters in the Southwest, deBuys was the founding chairman of the Valles Caldera Trust (2001-2004), which manages the 89,000-acre Valles Caldera National Preserve in northern New Mexico. Recent writing projects have taken him as far afield as Borneo and Lao PDR. He lives on a small farm in El Valle, New Mexico.
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
By Ken Holmes
Format:Hardcover
Like DeBuys, I live in New Mexico, but I think anyone not from the Land of Enchantment would enjoy this beautifully written book. In the spirit of Thoreau or Dillard perhaps, DeBuys takes us on a rambling walk on his farm, somewhere just off the High Road between Santa Fe and Taos. It is a pleasure to take this walk with him through his arroyos, creeks, meadows, and woods. Along the way, he meditates on the region's natural and human history, and on personal issues of divorce and death, but finds a peaceful sense of redemption in the beauty of his surroundings. This book is really about seeing, though, and seeing with clarity and grace.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
By Kyle Gardner
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
"The Walk" is a deep and thoughtful memoir. Nature writing at its best because the book pays close attention to the energy and mystery that pervade the natural world. This is book about a special place, but one that transcends a specific location. A place that offers healing, lessons for life, and lessons about relating to the landscape. Walking can certainly be a form of meditation and deBuys takes it to a higher level with this outstanding book. It brings to mind the ancient wisdom that goes something like, "As much may be learned by climbing a mountain 100 times as by climbing 100 mountains."
On a personal level, "The Walk" reminds me of a place I frequented over the course of 25 years. My parents once owned land in Colorado and we walked around the 80 acres hundreds of times over the years, including many midnight walks. We learned exquisite details of the land and creatures and saw changes, both subtle and obvious, over the course of a day, a season, and over many years, both on the land and across the surrounding territory. For the "saunterers" among us, "The Walk" is a must read.
By Kyle Gardner, author of Medicine Rock Reflections
On a personal level, "The Walk" reminds me of a place I frequented over the course of 25 years. My parents once owned land in Colorado and we walked around the 80 acres hundreds of times over the years, including many midnight walks. We learned exquisite details of the land and creatures and saw changes, both subtle and obvious, over the course of a day, a season, and over many years, both on the land and across the surrounding territory. For the "saunterers" among us, "The Walk" is a must read.
By Kyle Gardner, author of Medicine Rock Reflections
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Pulitzer Prize finalist William deBuys presents The Walk, a novel of the beauty of nature, and how it aids one man in the rediscovery of hope after the end of a long marriage and the death of a close friend. Set in the more secluded regions of New Mexico, The Walk particularly reflects upon the noble spirit of horses; equines literally and figuratively play a crucial role in the protagonist's long journey to healing. Written in a contemplative style reminiscent of Thoreau, The Walk is a moving expression of love of the land and its natural creatures.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Precise beautiful essay on country living
First, I read "River of Traps" and loved deBuys' style, personal without the sentimentality. Language is often precise and beautiful prose. Read more
Published 1 month ago by groundie
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Walk
For 27 years, author William deBuys walked a rather circuitous path near his cabin in the highlands of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Read more
Published 20 months ago by Cindy Bellinger
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