George Perkins Marsh (1801-1882) was the first to reveal the menace
of environmental misuse, to explain its causes, and to prescribe
reforms. David Lowenthal here offers fresh insights, from new
sources, into Marsh's career and shows his relevance today, in a
book which has its roots in but wholly supersedes Lowenthal's
earlier biography George Perkins Marsh: Versatile Vermonter (1958).
Marsh's devotion to the repair of nature, to the concerns of
working people, to women's rights, and to historical stewardship
resonate more than ever. His Vermont birthplace is now a national
park chronicling American conservation, and the crusade he launched
is now global. Marsh's seminal book Man and Nature is famed for its
ecological acumen. The clue to its inception lies in Marsh's
many-sided engagement in the life of his time. The broadest scholar
of his day, he was an acclaimed linguist, lawyer, congressman, and
renowned diplomat who served 25 years as U.S. envoy to Turkey and
to Italy. He helped found and guide the Smithsonian Institution,
shaped the Washington Monument, penned potent tracts on fisheries
and on irrigation, spearheaded public science, art, and
architecture. He wrote on camels and corporate corruption,
Icelandic grammar and Alpine glaciers. His pungent and provocative
letters illuminate life on both sides of the Atlantic. Like
Darwin's Origin of Species, Marsh's Man and Nature marked the
inception of a truly modern way of looking at the world, of taking
care lest we irreversibly degrade the fabric of humanized nature we
are bound to manage. Marsh's ominous warnings inspired
reforestation, watershed management, soil conservation, and nature
protection in his day and ours. George Perkins Marsh: Prophet of
Conservation was awarded the Association for American Geographers'
2000 J. B. Jackson Prize. The book was also on the shortlist for
the first British Academy Book Prize, awarded in December 2001.
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