shopping cart
Save up to 30% on our Staff Picks
Call us:  800-878-7323 HELP
McAfee SECURE helps keep you safe from identity theft, credit card fraud, spyware, spam, viruses and online scams.
Interviews | November 19, 2009

Dave: IMG Finding John Irving: The Powells.com Interview



[Editor's note: The following is a reprint of our 2005 interview with John Irving, whose new novel, Last Night in Twisted River, has just come out... Continue »

Ships free on qualified orders.
Add to Cart
$9.50
List price: $13.95
Used Trade Paper
Ships in 1 to 3 days
Add to Wishlist
Qty Store Section
1 Hawthorne Literature- A to Z

More copies of this ISBN:

Ecotopia 30TH Anniversary Edition

by Ernest Callenbach

Ecotopia 30TH Anniversary Edition Cover

ISBN13: 9780960432011
ISBN10: 0960432019
Condition: Standard
All Product Details

Only 1 left in stock at $9.50!

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

This is the 30th Anniversary edition of the classic environmental novel about a future in which a socially and ecologically responsible state is created in the West. The story is told by a reporter who is the first media vistor from the United States allowed.

What Our Readers Are Saying

Add a comment for a chance to win!
Average customer rating based on 2 comments:
OLLLGA, April 25, 2008 (view all comments by OLLLGA)
OLLLGA SAY GOOOOD BOOK! HUH!
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
(5 of 10 readers found this comment helpful)
PdxEcotopian, November 12, 2006 (view all comments by PdxEcotopian)
The novel?s setting: Northern California, Oregon, and Washington secede from the union, become Ecotopia, and close the border. Twenty years later, William Weston -- a reporter from a major newspaper -- journeys to there on a six-week assignment to explore and report on every aspect of Ecotopian life. Part of this book is written as a narrative, and part as a series of newspaper articles to be read by those ?left behind? in the U.S. This work makes you truly question ?normal? views, and opens ones eyes to a world of earth-friendly and person-friendly possibilities!

In Ecotopia, Weston is confronted with working ecological models: unprocessed food, total recycling (even clothing!), re-greening of cityscapes, and zero deforestation. Bicycles are the most common mode of transport, population growth is discouraged, and biodegradable materials are heavily used. ?Plastics [have] a short planned lifetime and?automatically self-destruct.? (p. 77) He discovers that Ecotopia is a society dedicated to the fundamental eco-agri-political goal of creating "stable-state life systems" in which humans live sustainably within the constraints and renewable resources of their environment(s).

Also, Weston is faced with many views that oppose his internalized ?American? morals: free-flowing cannabis use, polyamory (multi-partner family models), living socialism, twenty-hour work weeks, and true free speech. People live, school, and work together in small intimate communities, providing a tribal form of companionship missing from the narrator?s sterile world. He reflects, ?Ecotopians? marriages shade off more gradually into extended family connections, into friendships with both sexes?there are always good, solid alternatives to any relationship, however intense.? (p. 108)

What is most interesting to me is how Weston metamorphoses in this work. In the beginning, he is affronted, irritated, angered, and put off by both the eco-political and social aspects of Ecotopia. However ? like a flower blooming ? he grows more and more open to his environment, sensing its nurturing qualities to both himself and the earth. ?This new me is a stranger, an Ecotopian, and his advent fills me with terror, excitement, and strength?? (p. 166) He begins this journey as a wasteful automaton, and ends it as a communal polyamorist earth-loving idealist. This self-evolvement is awe-inspiring.
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
(7 of 9 readers found this comment helpful)
View all 2 comments

Product Details

ISBN:
9780960432011
Subtitle:
The Notebooks and Reports of William Weston
Author:
Callenbach, Ernest
Publisher:
Banyan Tree Books
Location:
Berkeley, Calif.
Subject:
General
Subject:
Fiction
Subject:
Science Fiction - General
Subject:
Science fiction
Subject:
Nature conservation
Subject:
Twenty-first century
Subject:
Utopias in literature
Series Volume:
no. 33
Publication Date:
June 2004
Binding:
Paperback
Language:
English
Pages:
167
Dimensions:
8.00x5.44x.51 in. .47 lbs.

Other books you might like

  1. $2.50 Used Trade Paper add to wish list
  2. $8.50 Used Trade Paper add to wish list
  3. $4.95 Used Trade Paper add to wish list
  4. $10.95 Used Trade Paper add to wish list

    The Story of B

    Daniel Quinn
  5. $7.95 Used Trade Paper add to wish list

    Reservation Blues

    Sherman Alexie
  6. $4.95 Used Mass Market add to wish list

    The Catcher in the Rye

    J D Salinger

Related Aisles

  • back to top

Powell's City of Books is an independent bookstore in Portland, Oregon, that fills a whole city block with more than a million new, used, and out of print books. Shop those shelves — plus literally millions more books, DVDs, and eBooks — here at Powells.com.