Abbey’s Road

Edward Abbey

I usually skip the introduction to a book, even a nonfiction book, but as I thumbed through the opening pages of Abbey’s Road, looking for the start of chapter one, I noticed correspondence embedded in the text. Specifically, it was Abbey’s letter to the editors of Ms Magazine (which Abbey spelled Mizz Magazine), followed by an equally witty and cutting response from Gloria Steinem herself. Neither letter saw print in the magazine, but Abbey preserved them for posterity in the pages of his book.

His introduction includes correspondence to and from a number of persons, both famous and unknown. One such correspondent apparently confused him with the notable playwright Edward Albee and chastised him for his recent departure from his usual style.

Further comments in the introduction mark Abbey as a defender and promoter of western literature and nature writing in general. He specifically mentions Joseph Wood Krutch, great granddaddy of western conservationists, and other nature writers, but he reserves the heir to Thoreau honor for Virginia (and Puget Sound) resident Annie Dilliard. He then takes exception to Dillard’s constant invocation of the Deity, stating that use of the simple word mystery (without capitalization) would suffice.

Beyond the introduction, the book is divided into three unequal parts, with part one, a travelogue, being the longest. Here we see Abbey in his element, the untamed wilderness and cattle ranches of the American Southwest, with trips further afield to the Great Barrier Reef, Aboriginal Australia, and an uninhabited island off the coast of Mexico. He also recounts a rafting trip on the Rio Grande River. Aside from the uninhabited island, he encounters a variety of interesting people along the way, including a barmaid whom he is not quite successful in convincing to travel with him across the Outback. That story though, is pure Abbey.

Part two is devoted to polemics, essay style writing which takes a specific view and gives no credence to any opposing argument. Despite his years supporting himself as a park ranger, cowboy, fire tower lookout and teacher, Abbey shows no respect for the Park Service bureaucracy nor its sister agency in the Department of Agriculture, the U.S Forest Service. His comments are equally likely to infuriate cattle ranchers, university administrators, feminists, and gun control advocates. Abbey loved the American West, and was equally at home bird watching or hunting deer. He took the construction of Glen Canyon Dam as a personal affront. In this section Abbey confronts the powers that be in the spirit of his better known fictional work The Monkey Wrench Gang. 

The third and shortest part is devoted to personal history. It lacks the lyric passages of his nonfiction book, Dessert Solitaire, my personal favorite of his works, but perhaps gives more insight into the man, his life’s work, and his motivations. It includes a story of a hiking trip with his young daughter, child of the wife who died of leukemia. This particular story shows a tender side to a man normally regarded as a grizzled old curmudgeon. 

Abbey’s Road provides a retrospective of his life up to that point in time. His best known books were already written, but more were yet to appear. I recommend it highly to anyone who loves the outdoors, and is at least willing to suspend judgment about his anarchist politics.