Great Plains Studies, Center for
Date of this Version
1995
Abstract
On its surface, Donald Worster's collection of forceful and eloquent essays appears to revisit the subjects and themes he has explored in his previous books. There are sixteen essays in Wealth of Nature. The first three and the last one explore the concerns and practice of environmental history. Five essays investigate the ecological consequences of American agriculture, particularly in the Great Plains. Worster explored this subject in his Bancroft Prize-winning book, Dust Bowl. The next three essays primarily concern the economic and ecological irrationalities of irrigation in the West, a subject that Worster previously investigated in his book, Rivers of Empire. Finally, the twelfth through fifteenth essays-like Worster's first book, Nature's Economy-are explorations of human society's various apprehensions and misapprehensions of the natural world.
Comments
Published in Great Plains Quarterly 15:3 (Summer 1995). Copyright © 1995 Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.