Description
Book SynopsisJust what was so wild about the Wild West? Americans have had an enduring yet ambivalent obsession with the West as both a place and a state of mind. This book offers a cultural and historical analysis of how ideas of wildness have shaped the ways Euro-Americans have perceived, reacted to, and acted upon the West for nearly five hundred years.
Trade ReviewMove over Henry Nash Smith, Roderick Nash, and Richard Slotkin. This stunning volume immediately vaults Michael Johnson to the forefront of authorities on the Wilderness West. A brilliant and profound study. Richard W. Etulain, author of Beyond the Missouri: The Story of the American West ""Provides us all with a new and insightful way of looking forward that places him in the rarified company of Frederick Jackson Turner, Henry Nash Smith, and Patricia Nelson Limerick in providing a fresh western synthesis."" Paul A. Hutton, author of Phil Sheridan and His Army ""An astonishing book - an epic, often jaw-dropping survey of our centuries-long love affair with the untamed West."" Michael Steiner, coeditor of Many Wests: Place, Culture, and Regional Identity
