Farewell, Promised Land: Waking from the California Dream (Hardcover)

~ (Author), Gray Brechin (Author) "I noticed the emptiness of the sky long before I saw it on the land..." (more)
Key Phrases: golden state, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Gold Rush (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Looks like a coffee-table book, but it's really a political treatise and a call to action . . . one of the single best, most compelling, and often brutal histories of the 'California Dream' that I've ever seen." -- San Francisco Bay Guardian

Product Description

Historical accounts of California tell of flocks of birds so dense in the sky that they cast a shadow on the ground, and of thunderous rivers of geese, ducks, and swans moving down the state to the lagoons of Mexico and beyond. Today, citizens and travelers in California take for granted skies empty of almost everything but the contrails of airplanes. But far more than wildlife is missing from California today. In text and photographs, Farewell, Promised Land documents the stark contrast between the California landscape of this past and what it has become, as it traces the evolution of the California environment, and looks ahead to what the future holds. When writer Gray Brechin and photographer Robert Dawson received the 1992 Dorothea Lange-Paul Taylor Prize from Duke University's Center for Documentary Studies, they began a five-year project of driving and flying around California to record the present state of its environment. This book is the result of that collaboration. In six thematic chapters dealing with Loss, Mining, Farming, Cities, Energy, and Health, the authors provide a sobering look at California's environment. A concluding chapter introduces individuals and organizations now attempting to redeem the state from its present course. Farewell, Promised Land is a superb vehicle for communicating the causes, context, and seriousness of environmental and social disruptions in California. It is unique in that it successfully documents topics such as energy, health, and cities, and brings this information directly to bear on environmental issues. Appealing to the intellect as well as to our sense of aesthetics, Brechin and Dawson provide a timely wake-up call in this brave, honest, and straightforward assessment of California's fate.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 253 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press; 1 edition (March 31, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520211235
• ISBN-13: 978-0520211230
• Product Dimensions: 11.9 x 9.9 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.9 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,734,125 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Required reading for ALL environmentalists, May 19, 1999

By A Customer

It would be a shame if this seminal work on environmental destruction and the environmental movement were pigeonholed as a "California book." It is of equal interest to East Coast opinion-makers, Washington policy-makers, and all of those with an interest in environmental protection throughout the state, nation, and internationally. Thoroughly researched, it includes astonishing, little-known facts; but it is also highly accessible, written in lucid prose, blessedly jargon free, and including the telling, memorable anecdote. The photographs are stunning and will have an impact on even the casual browser - so the book will have an effect beyond "preaching to the choir." Perhaps most important, the book ends on a high note of hope, describing and lauding those environmental heroes and heroines who have made a genuine difference, one protest movement at a time.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A sad and beautiful masterpiece, March 25, 1999

By A Customer

The story of our time is, sadly, what happens to the natural world when all restraint and common sense are abandoned. California, the dream state, has taken a terrible beating in the last 150 years. Dawson and Brechin document the devastation with brilliant prose and photographs. Also included: signs of hope, people who've taken a stand to protect some areas from the onslaught.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A beautiful history of California environmental degradation, December 23, 1999

By A Customer

This book beautifully chronicles the damage that has been wreaked upon the California landscape in the last cnetury and a half. Particularly interesting is the commentary about the miner ethos that has prevailed not only among miners but also among loggers, agribusinessmen, and developers, leading to the pillage of the land for the gain of a few. However, the book was also weak here when it contrasted this ethos with that in Italy which has resulted in the preservation of the countryside. It seems only fair that the weaknesses of the Italian system, including the negative impacts of a slower economy and weak central government on the people's well-being, be at least acknowledged here as well. However, all in all the book is still very worthwhile. I will now never be able to forget what this state might have been.