A few years ago, I met Gary Snyder at an event at Baylor. I had read some of his poetry, and I was in awe of all those I read. A friend passed along a copy of his volume of essays, Back on the Fire. He has authored numerous collections of poetry and prose. He won the Pulitzer prize in 1975 and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1992 and 2005. He has also won the prestigious Bollingen Poetry Prize among other prizes. He has lived in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada since 1970. Many of the essays in this collection from 2007 are quite relevant today.

The first deals with “Migration/Immigration.” He writes, “There are those who argue that since the majority of the North American population is descended from immigrants it would be somehow wrong to change past policies and try to slow immigration down or even bring it to a halt. This backward-looking position fails to see that, although people do move to new places, they can be expected in time to become members of that place and to think in terms of the welfare of the place itself. People who have moved do no remain immigrants, with ‘Old Country’ nostalgia, forever—when our loyalties are to the land we live on, the debate changes” (17). If only we could have a real, honest, humanitarian debate.

Preserving the environment is important to Snyder. He writes, “We may speak of ‘public land’ or ‘private land,’ but the truth is we are in the presence of an ancient mystery—life itself—and the great life-communities within which all beings thrive and die. The pines were contemporary with the dinosaurs; the sequoias were a dominant forest that swept across the north Pacific rim and into much of Asia, long ago. Oakes are in several genus found on every continent except Antarctica. Indeed, ‘distinguished strangers from another world.’ They are all amazing. We live in a lovely and mysterious realm” (37).

Of course, Snyder must weigh in on poetry. He writes, “People are always asking ‘what’s the use of poetry?’ The mystery of language, the poetic imagination, and the mind of compassion are roughly one and the same, and through poetry perhaps they can keep guiding the world toward occasional moments of peace, gratitude, and delight. One hesitates to ask for more” (60). What a lovely way to explain poetry!

During an interview, Snyder explained poetry this way, “The act of making something, bringing elements together and creating a new thing with craft and wit hidden in it, is a great pleasure. It’s not the only sort of pleasure, but it is challenging and satisfying, and not unlike other sorts of creating and building. In Greek ‘poema’ means ‘makings.’ It doesn’t change with the years, or with the centuries.” (99). My large collection of poetry—dating back almost 8,000 years—can attest to the truth of Gary Snyder’s words.

Gary Snyder is an interesting, gentle, soft-spoken lover of nature and all its wonders. He advocates for the environment and mourns the loss of species, habitats, flowers, and trees. His slim volume of essays, Back on Fire, is an interesting look at the world we inhabit. He is not pedantic, but he rather gently gathers words and phrases to support the importance of this tiny blue dot. 5 Stars.

--Jim, 2/20/18 ( )

Splendid to get to hear the author read from this work when it was new. ( )

Snyder, a prize-winning poet and critic with an international reputation, has collected a number of nonfiction pieces written over the past several years into Back on the Fire: Essays. Like his most recent collection of poems, Danger on Peaks, these essays are devoted to discussing a planet--and a culture--in the grip of catastrophic change.

For Snyder, change is not a bad thing. The trouble arises when humans mistakenly assume a position outside nature. Snyder returns again and again to his basic premise: that we are not just part of nature, we are nature. No matter what our technological feats have accomplished, what happens to the planet happens to us.

The heart of the book is a pair of essays: "Entering the Fiftieth Millennium" and "Lifetimes with Fire." In the first, Snyder adopts a way of thinking about time that is different from the Western mind's habit of counting eras based on its own civilization. He neatly moves the time scale back to more accurately reflect humanity's position in the natural world. As a result, we're not nearly as "new and different" as a 21-century timescale might lead us to believe. Taking the cave paintings of France as an example, Snyder shows that art--and, by extension, human consciousness--has long existed in ways that we perceive as contemporary. Putting humanity's history on a 50,000-year time scale, he helps us see ourselves right-sized. "Modern man" is a blip on the radar, not the apex of evolution.

Thinking about time in this larger way changes our perceptions of the world. As a poet, Snyder is well aware that language alters both time and reality. If humans see ourselves as part of a long, natural tradition, we might--just might--be less likely to disrupt nature's order.

That attitude of living in nature rather than observing it inhabits "Lifetimes with Fire." From his first "real" job on fire watch to a lifetime spent attempting to both respect fire's place in the ecology of the Sierra and also save his own home, Snyder's narrative is respectful and honest. Among the ironies: As a young man on fire lookout, he thought stopping forest fires heroic. He now believes that forest-management policy was the worst possible for the health of the forests--especially since, in the long run (the only time that matters), it actually made fires worse.

But Snyder doesn't lose his sense of humor. The delightful "Regarding 'Smokey the Bear Sutra'" mixes spirituality and a huge dose of ironic laughter. Snyder crafts a sutra--a "talk given by a Buddha-teacher," which, according to tradition, is both anonymous and free--that reveals the true nature of Smokey the Bear, so misunderstood by the USDA Forest Service.

In the sutra, Smokey is freed from mascot status to become a defender of the natural, including humans. He takes on the title of the "Great Bear" with the "role of teaching and enlightening through the practice and examination of both the creative and destructive sides of Fire."

(From the Sacramento News & Review, 4/5/07, http://www.newsreview.com/sacramento/Content?oid=305860) ( )