Best of Edward Abbey 2ND Edition

In 1984, the late great Edward Abbey compiled this reader, endeavoring, as he says in his preface, "to present what I think is both the best and most representative of my writing--so far." Two decades later, it remains the only major collection of his work chosen by Abbey himself, a rich feast of fiction and prose by the singular American writer whom Larry McMurtry called "the Thoreau of the American West" and whom Alice Hoffman hailed as "the voice of all that is ornery and honorable."

Devoted Abbey fans along with readers just discovering his work will find a mother lode of treasures here: generous chunks of his best novels, including The Brave Cowboy, Black Sun, and his classic The Monkey Wrench Gang; and more than a score of his evocative, passionate, trenchant essays--a genre in which he produced acknowledged masterpieces such as Desert Solitaire. There is even an excerpt from a novel he was working on in 1984, eventually published as The Fool's Progress. Scattered throughout are the author's own petroglyph-style sketches.

Abbey went on publishing new work until his untimely death in 1989 at age sixty, so this new edition includes a selection of later Abbey: a chapter from Hayduke Lives!, the hilarious sequel to The Monkey Wrench Gang; excerpts from his revealing journals; a little-known account of a trip to the Sea of Cortez; and examples of his poetry. A new foreword by Doug Peacock --Abbey's close friend and the model for the flamboyant activist Hayduke--offers a fond appreciation of this largerthan- life figure in American letters.

"The original fly in the ointment."--Thomas McGuane

"He had about him an authenticity that springs from the page and is beloved by a rising generation of readers."--Edward Hoagland

[Asterisk * indicates material added to the Second Edition.]

*Foreword

The Author's Preface to His Own Book

From Jonathan Troy (1954)

From The Brave Cowboy (1956)

From Fire on the Mountain (1962)

From Desert Solitaire (1968)

Cowboys

The Moon-Eyed Horse

Havasu

The Dead Man at Grandview Point

Bedrock and Paradox

From Appalachian Wilderness (1970)

Appalachia

From Black Sun (1971)

From The Monkey Wrench Gang (1975)

Seldom Seen at Home

From The Journey Home (1977)

The Great American Desert

Death Valley

Manhattan Twilight, Hoboken Night

Telluride Blues--A Hatchet Job

From Abbey's Road (1979)

Anna Creek

The Outback

A Desert Isle

Sierra Madre

Down There in the Rocks

Science with a Human Face

In Defense of the Redneck

Fire Lookout

The Sorrows of Travel

From Good News (1980)

From Down the River (1982)

Down the River with Henry Thoreau

Watching the Birds: The Windhover

Of Protest

My Friend Debris

Floating

From The Rites of Spring (novel in progress)

*From Beyond the Wall: Essays from the Outside (1984)

Down to the Sea of Cortez

*From The Fool's Progress: An Honest Novel (1989)

*From Hayduke Lives! (1990)

Bonnie's Return

*From Earth Apples: The Poetry of Edward Abbey (1994)

Flash Flood

Down the River

A Sonnet for Everett Ruess

*From Confessions of a Barbarian: Selections from the Journals (1994)