Utne Weeder
Our favorite new books, music, & more
May / June 2005
Staff Utne magazine
BOOKS
RELATED CONTENT
Two decades of life with the odd little newsletter that grew up...
Our staff’s picks of good books...
The Utne Weeder Our staff's selection of good reads May June 1999 Issue By , Utne Reader Sacred Le...
Our staff's selection of good reads...
Our staff's selection of good reads...
WILDLIFE CONSERVATION The Back Road to Crazy:
Stories from the Field edited by Jennifer Bove
(University of Utah Press, $19.95). Much romanticized and therefore
misunderstood, conservation fieldwork is brought down to earth in
this piquant collection of essays. Bove has compiled inspiring,
trying, sometimes tragic, and often disgusting tales from field
researchers who work to preserve natural habitats around the world.
Definitely to be read outdoors, wearing boots, with the smell of
skunk lingering in the air. -- Jessica Coulter
GASTRONOMICA Angry Trout Cafe Notebook: Friends,
Recipes, and the Culture of Sustainability by George
Wilkes (Northwind Sailing, $26.95). In Grand Marais, Minnesota, on
the shores of Lake Superior, there are some very angry trout. The
humans who fry them up, however, are conscientious, clever, and
positively delightful. So too is this new book by the proprietor of
the Angry Trout Cafe. An ode to sustainability, the book offers
great tips on how to run an organic business. Plus: A decade's
worth of the cafe's newspaper ads will have you laughing, crying,
and looking for an outline of Elvis in your next fish sandwich.
Recipes included. -- Laine Bergeson
MEMOIR The Art of Teaching by Jay
Parini (Oxford University Press, $17.95). Declaring the college
classroom one of the few places left where young people can
'confront their own best selves,' Parini, an English professor at
Middlebury College, shares his quiet wisdom on guiding students
toward the pleasures of critical thinking. Equal parts memoir,
essay, and practical advice, Parini's handbook for the writer who
teaches is a gentle, elegant tribute to those who turn the life of
the mind into a performance art. -- Jeremiah Creedon
POETRY In the Dark by Ruth Stone
(Copper Canyon, $22). An aging poet's failing eyesight informs this
collection of 94 new poems, some of which recall the spirit of
Russian poet Anna Akhmatova. Dark but not hopeless, they spring
from Stone's lucid inner vision, which is straightforward, musical,
and defiant: 'My life is wild with slippery paper. . . . And I'm
less lonely anymore.' -- Chris Dodge
MUSIC
JAZZ Far Side of Here by the Brooklyn
Sax Quartet (Omnitone). You won't even miss the bass and drums as
these four horns bob and weave and play with the abandon of
children -- albeit very smart, well-trained children. Whether
they're rendering their own songs or songs by Dizzy Gillespie and
Billy Strayhorn, the musicians get deep inside the compositions and
blow their way out with melody, harmony, and rhythm. -- Keith
Goetzman
JAZZ Mountain Passages by Dave Douglas
(Greenleaf). This always adventurous trumpeter played an especially
sweet gig at Italy's Sound of the Dolomites festival in 2003:
Performers and audience hiked to a scenic Alpine vantage point,
where Douglas and his band played music he composed for the
occasion. The result is this expansive suite of songs that skirts
the sublime. -- K.G.
Page: 1 |
2 |
3 |
Next >>