The Quiet World: Saving Alaska's Wilderness Kingdom, 1910-1960

Written by Douglas Brinkley

Narrated by Andrew Garman

In this fascinating follow-up to his New York Times bestseller Wilderness Warrior, acclaimed historian Douglas Brinkley offers a riveting, expansive look at the past and present battle to preserve Alaska’s wilderness. Brinkley explores the colorful diversity of Alaska’s wildlife, arrays the forces that have wreaked havoc on its primeval arctic refuge—from Klondike Gold Rush prospectors to environmental disasters like the Exxon-Valdez oil spill—and documents environmental heroes from Theodore Roosevelt to Dwight Eisenhower and beyond. Not merely a record of Alaska’s past, Quiet World is a compelling call-to-arms for sustainability, conservationism, and conscientious environmental stewardship—a warning that the land once called Seward’s Folly may go down in history as America’s Greatest Mistake.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperAudio
• Release date: Jan 18, 2011
• ISBN: 9780062027184

Douglas Brinkley

Douglas Brinkley is the Katherine Tsanoff Brown Chair in Humanities and Professor of History at Rice University, presidential historian for the New-York Historical Society, trustee of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library, and a contributing editor at Vanity Fair. The Chicago Tribune dubbed him “America’s New Past Master.” He is the recipient of such distinguished environmental leadership prizes as the Frances K. Hutchison Medal (Garden Club of America), the Robin W. Winks Award for Enhancing Public Understanding of National Parks (National Parks Conservation Association), and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Lifetime Heritage Award. His book The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast received the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award. He was awarded a Grammy for Presidential Suite and is the recipient of seven honorary doctorates in American studies. His two-volume, annotated Nixon Tapes won the Arthur S. Link–Warren F. Kuehl Prize. He lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife and three children.

Reviews for The Quiet World

[banjo123 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I read this in preparation for an Alaskan vacation (which was fabulous). It turns out, however, that this book is not really about Alaska. I spoke to a bookseller in Ketchikan, who agreed. He shelves it in history.This is the second book in Brinkley’s planned Wilderness Cycle. The first was [Wilderness Warrior], which centered on Theodore Roosevelt’s role in the conservation movement in the US. I loved that book, and now drive my family crazy by giving mini-lectures about TR whenever we approach a National Park or Wilderness area. The Quiet World continues the story of the US’s conservation history. It has dozens of fascinating side characters, but lacks a major focal character, such as Roosevelt, and isn’t as good a book as Wilderness Warrior. Still, I really enjoyed the book, and would recommend it to anyone with an interest in environmentalism,One of Brinkley’s weaknesses as a writer is a tendency to go off on tangents. He knows a lot of fascinating facts, and can’t resist sharing them. I didn’t mind, because I was usually intrigued myself, but I’m not clear that readers of this book really needed a history of William O. Douglas’s personal life or the section on Allen Ginsberg. We are also regaled by stories of dozens of camping trips, only some of which took place in Alaska. We hear about TR’s camping at the Grand Canyon, even though TR never set foot in Alaska.The strength of the book is it description of how many people worked hard to preserve wilderness in Alaska. I enjoyed reading about these characters: Roosevelt, Muir, Gifford Pinchot, Aldo Leopold, Robert Marshal, Mardy and Olaus Murie,William O. Douglas, etc. Mardy Murie is a new heroine for me. The reading, combined with my Alaskan vacation, made me feel more committed to preserving the Artic National Wildlife Refuge. I support Obama, but I do wish we had a president who was more committed to the outdoors---someone like Theodore Roosevelt, who loved to camp.