Landscape and memory

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Title:

Landscape and memory

Author:

Schama, Simon.

Personal Author:

Schama, Simon.

Edition:

First edition.

Publication Information:

New York : A.A. Knopf : Distributed by Random House, [1995]

Physical Description:

xi, 652 pages, 37 unnumbered pages of plates (some folded) : illustrations (some color), color maps ; 24 cm

Summary:

Opening a radically new and original path into history, Simon Schama explores the scenery of our Western culture, both real landscapes and landscapes of the mind that have given us our sense of homeland, the dark woods of our imagined origins. What unfolds is a series of compelling journeys through space and time: from the ancient woodland of Poland, a symbol over the centuries of national endurance, through the forest birthplace of the German psyche, to the Big Trees of Yosemite that gave a new nation its holy past. Through all of history, from pre-classical antiquity to the Third Reich and beyond, Schama uncovers the myths and memories that have stamped themselves on our most basic social instincts and institutions: territorial identity, the wild and domestic, mortality and immortality.

Language:

English

Contents:

Wood: Detour ; In the realm of the Lithuanian bison: Royal beasts of Baiłowieża. Last foray. Mortality, immortality ; Der Holzweg : the track through the woods: Hunt for Germania. Blood in the forest. Arminius Redivivus ; Waldsterben ; Liberties of the greenwood: Green men. Living in the woods : laws and outlaws. Hearts of oak and bulwarks of liberty? Pillars of Gaul. In extremis ; Verdant cross: Grizzlies. Vegetable resurrection. Pathfinders. Verdant cross. Tabernacles. Volvos at the sepulchre -- Water: Streams of consciousness: Flow of myth. Circulation : arteries and mysteries. Holy confluences. Fons sapientiae. Nile brought to Tiber. Bernini and the four rivers ; Bloodstreams: Sir Walter Ralegh loses his drift. Man in the brown paper boat. Power lines. Political theory of whitebait. Bodies of water. Waters of Isis : the Thames and the Nile -- Rock: Dinocrates and the shaman : altitude, beatitude, magnitude: Woman on Mount Rushmore. Donocrates and the shaman. Elevations. Exorcising Pilate. Calvaries of convenience. Last Sacro Monte? ; Vertical empires, cerebral chasms: Delightful horror. Vertical empires, cerebral chasms. Seat of virtue. Conquests. Albert the Great. Prospects of salvation -- Wood, water, rock: Arcadia redesigned: Et in Arcadia ego. Primitives and pastorals. Rudeness and confusion. An Arcadia for the people : the Forest of Fontainebleau. Arcadia under glass. Wild, hairy huckleberry.

Subject Term:

Landscapes -- History.

Landscape assessment -- History.

Human ecology -- History.

Landscapes -- Symbolic aspects.