Coming into the Country

This is the kind of book I love most: one that carries you into the wilderness, makes you feel like you're really there, up in wild Alaska, as McPhee goes into depth describing the land, the people, the way of life in rural Alaska, with eloquence and lovely evoked imagery and phrases that allow you to almost feel you're there smelling the fragrance of the forest.I like reading about this rural, outback way of life that I would be unsuited for in so many ways...I feel like I get a chance to live that life to some extent through reading about it in detail.I didn't care for the chapter "What they were hunting for", which I thought did not fit in with the rest of the book. I loved reading about the day to day lives of the settlers, trappers and miners.By the end of the book, though, as much as I admired their ability to live in such wild lands, I also found I was depressed by the settlers' reliance on mining and trapping, extractive methods of living on the land. I would not have difficulty with small-scale mining and trapping operations, but I was disturbed by the description of mining in wild Alaska using large Caterpillar machinery, in fact the largest bulldozers that the Caterpillar company makes, and tearing up enormous acreage in a search for gold. Similarly, I began to feel depressed by the number of wild animals killed, not for food, but just to sell their pelts.It's the story of human destruction of the planet, that people think their actions are irrelevant given the scale of their surroundings. They'll argue that they are only working a very very tiny area of a huge wilderness. Well, the oceans of the planet are vast, and yet we've managed to overfish them to the point where some are saying we have come to the point of threatening all life in the oceans. As well, all life on the planet is interconnected, and it's not possible to destroy one area without impacting other areas, as we are learning perhaps all too late about the destruction of the earth's forests.So while in 1976, 43 years ago when this book was written, the life of these miners and trappers may have seemed more romantic and idyllic, in the context of the problems we face today with destruction of the planet, I think that one can no longer view these people as romantically "living off the land" when they are ruining landscapes with giant Caterpillar tractors and killing hundreds of animals a year to sell their fur.

John McPhee tells his story of Alaska in three parts – and, to my mind, it’s the third part that matters. The second we could really do without.The book begins with McPhee’s travels with federal land managers surveying options for national parks, national wildlife refuges, and other federal lands as part of the great land settlements of the 1970s. As a man from New Jersey who is comfortable with the outdoors, here McPhee learns to see Alaska as a recreationist, in the company of scientists and recreation specialists taking the measure of the land. It’s a reasonable introduction, but I’m not sure it’s an essential one.The second part recounts the political battle over moving the capital from Juneau. That must have seen important in 1976, but we now know that nothing came of it. Even in 1976, it’s not clear how it would have fit with the first or third part. It’s an interesting story, full of the kinds of characters that populate McPhee’s journalism, but it seems expendable in the book as a whole.The third part is the meat of the book, the stories of people living in the upper Yukon. Most live on the tributaries of the Yukon from Eagle and Circle down to Fairbanks, or they live in one of those towns. These are interesting people, and McPhee naturally sympathizes with their problems.In fact, that empathy defines his conclusions – McPhee sides with the small-scale devastator of Alaska’s environment, the pioneer looking to escape the crowded Lower 48 in hopes of crowding a new frontier. Indeed, those pioneers have already succeeded in crowding Anchorage and the Matanuska Valley, with Palmer and especially Wasilla just chain restaurants, chain hotels, Safeways, and suburban developments.McPhee had hoped that Alaska would remain “the last place in the United States where the pioneer impulse can leap from confinement,” but he seems not to have realized that his impulse would do to Alaska what it has done to New Jersey, or Los Angeles, or Missoula.

This is an eloquent description of the people and the country of Alaska. It is a hard place. It attracts characters and the author walks through it all. Enjoy.

Top 10 all-time favorite list!I love coming into the country by John McPhee and have read it several times. I never get tired of it.

I enjoy John McPhee's writing. I started with The Pine Barrens. Which was a quick engaging read. I have not read this one yet but have skimmed a bit and look forward to it.

The title of this book might be Everybody In Alaska Is Crazy. With its vastness, wildlife, natural beauty, killing winters, and indigenous tribes, Alaska attracts a lot of eccentrics: survivalists, religious nuts, modern-day trappers, gold miners, and would-be frontiersmen fed up with life in the lower 48. Starting with the search for a new state capital, and ending with a minute look at one remote town, the author tries to explain Alaska's unique personality and how it got that way. Memorable quote "The 55 gallon (oil) drum is so common across Alaska's landscape that it's earned... informal status as Alaska's State Flower."

Not McPhees best effort. Somewhat plodding, repetitive almost as though he was purposely padding to increase length. If this were my first of his books I've read, it would have been my last. Several of his other books are far superior.

I’ve read this book already, but it was someone else’s copy. I wanted my own. So I could read it again.

This book was recommended to me by a colleague when he heard that I was looking at making a television programme in Alaska. He told me that it would give me a valuable insight into the country and the people that live there & WOW, was he right!It's ever so readable, although infuriating in places as John McPhee paints a brilliant picture of the characters that he meets in the narrative, begins wonderful tales around their lives and then, on occasion, veers off on another fascinating strand leaving you wanting to find out more about those that have just left.That said though, I really would recommend this book whether you are visiting Alaska in person, from your armchair, or planning on Coming Into the Country yourself. I for one will be looking out for more of his books.

Liked the mix of characters, the honesty of the writing, my mate in our South Island would enjoy it to. I like the factual nature of the story too.