Turning back

the long version

"Two hundred years ago Lewis and Clark reported finding in the American Northwest a vast forest of ancient evergreens. In Turning Back Robert Adams looks again at the region's trees, discovering evidence both of America's failure and of a continuing promise." "President Jefferson's primary charge to Lewis and Clark was to prepare the way for American commerce. They tried to do this, as well as make money for themselves. Historians still speculate about why, upon his return, Lewis lapsed into depression and apparently committed suicide. "Going east," Adams suggests, "was more difficult than going west."" "What is the future? Turning Back documents two kinds of predictive evidence. On the one hand we observe the results of greed so unrestrained that they are indistinguishable from those of nihilism. On the other we see what still lives unharmed, whether by our design or neglect or Providence; in these pictures the tone is celebratory, as in a prayer book."--BOOK JACKET.