Annals of the former world
"Twenty years ago, when John McPhee began his journeys back and forth across the United States, he planned to describe a cross-section of North America at about the fortieth parallel and, in the process, come to an understanding not only of the science but of the style of the geologists he traveled with." "Like the terrain it covers, Annals of the Former World tells a many-layered tale, and the reader may choose one of many paths through it, guided by twenty-five new maps and the "Narrative Table of Contents" (an essay outlining the history and structure of the project). Read sequentially, the book is an organic succession of set pieces, flashbacks, biographical sketches, and histories of the human and lithic kind; approached systematically, it can be a North American geology primer, an exploration of plate tectonics, or a study of geologic time and the development of the time scale."--BOOK JACKET.
Stats for nerds
12recommend
22mentions
19people
2012–2026years
59% recommend32% neutral9% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- "If by some fiat I had to restrict all this writing to one sentence, this is the one I would choose: The summit of Mt. Everest is marine limestone."
John McPhee from the wonderful Annals of the former world
- For people interested in the subject generally I highly recommend John McPhee's anthology "Annals of the Former World." Actually I highly recommend everything John McPhee has written but this is a good start :).
- John McPhee's wonderful and Pulitzer-winning non-fiction natural history The Annals of the Former World about geology—specifically North American geology as exposed in highway road cuts!
This title which was collects a series of books originally published in series and only collected in a single volume subsequently,
happened to have been written over the years during which plate tectonic theory was still being fiercely debated, indeed some of the characters contested it.
By that happy accident the book is thus simultaneously several things:
- a marvelous natural history of the United States revealed through characteristically engaging and evocative personal narratives
- a look at North American geology which over the course of the books collected is increasingly revealed
- a very effective communication of what geological _deep time_ really means, and
- a fascinating look into the inner workings of scientific inquiry and discourse: messy, passionate, exquisite, invaluable
Of particular local interest is the must-read Assembling California, the final book collected, which contains a duly famous second by second account of how the Loma Prieta earthquake went down.
A nice introduction:
https://californiacurated.com/2024/09/06/looking-back-john-m...
- If you’re interested in this stuff I definitely recommend checking out ‘Annals of the Former World’ if you haven’t already. I have no geology background but found it utterly riveting
https://www.amazon.com/Annals-Former-World-John-McPhee/dp/03...
- John McPhee is an amazing writer. These articles eventually became his book, Assembling California, which in 1998 was republished as part of a collection of his books on geology entitled Annals of the Former World.
- John McPhee: Annals of the former world, Simon Winchester: The Map that Changed the World, Lutgens et al.: Essentials of Geology
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