LISTENING POINT

"Listening Point tells of what I have seen and heard on a bare glaciated spit of rock in the Quetico-Superior country. Each time I have gone there I have found something new that has opened up whole realms of thought and interest. From it I have glimpsed the immensity of space and at times the grandeur of creation. "I believe that I have experienced there one of the oldest satisfactions of man; when as he gazed upon the earth and sky, he sensed the first vague glimmerings of meaning in the universe. I know that while we were born with curiosity and wonder, and our early years are full of the adventure they bring, such inherent joys are often lost. I also know that, being deep within us, their latent glow can be fanned to flame again by awareness and an open mind. "Listening Point is dedicated to rekindling that flame by capturing this almost forgotten sense of wonder, and learning from rocks and trees and all the life that surrounds them truths that can encompass all. "I named this place Listening Point because only when one comes to listen, only when one comes sharpens one's awareness, can one see and hear in the sense in which I use these words. Everyone has a listening point somewhere, some quiet place where he can contemplate the awesome universe. This book is simply the story of what such a place has meant to me. The experiences that have been mine can be known by anyone who will make the effort." Thus the author of The Singing Wilderness sets the tone of his new book-a book that not only successfully recaptures the to-be-treasured sense of wonder of which he speaks, but also brings to life, in all its essential grandeur, the unparalleled heritage of lakes and rivers and forests we are so fortunate to be able to call our own. Listening Point is a book that will rekindle spirits wearied by the turmoils of twentieth-century living-that will teach us a new way to look at the world around us and to feel the better for it. With 28 magnificent black-and-white drawings by Francis Lee Jacques.

Autorentext

Sigurd F. Olson was born in Chicago in 1899. His family moved to northern Wisconsin in 1905. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin, he also pursued post-graduate work there in geology, supplementing it with advanced studies in plant and animal ecology at the University of Illinois. For a number of years he taught biology at Ely Junior College (Minnesota), where he later was dean. He has been recognized nationally with many awards and honorary degrees and has served as consultant to the federal government on wilderness preservation and ecological problems, as adviser to the Izaak Walton League of America, and as president of the Wilderness Society and the National Parks Association. His books include The Singing Wilderness (1956), Listening Point (1958), The Lonely Land (1961), Runes of the North (1963), and Open Horizons (1969). A season-by-season selection of his writings, Sigurd F. Olson's Wilderness Days, was published in 1972. Interpreter, enjoyer-and conserver-of our natural heritage, he lives and works in Ely, Minnesota, gateway to the Quetico-Superior region.