outline_us_lit

nature essayist Rick Bass (1958- ),born in Texas and educated as apetroleum geologist, writes of elementalconfrontations betweenoutdoorsmen and nature in hisstory collection In the LoyalMountains (1995) and the novelWhere the Sea Used To Be (1998).Texan Larry McMurtry (1936- )draws on his ranch childhood inHorseman, Pass By (1961), madeinto the movie Hud in 1963, anunsentimental portrait of therancher’s world. Leaving Cheyenne(1963) and its successor, The LastPicture Show (1966), which wasalso made into a film, evoke thefading of a way of life in Texas smalltowns. McMurtry’s best-knownwork is Lonesome Dove (1985), anarchetypal western epic novelabout a cattle drive in the 1870sthat became a successful televisionminiseries. His recent worksinclude Comanche Moon (1997).The West of multiethnic writersis less heroic and often more forwardlooking. One of the bestknownChicana writers is SandraCisneros (1954- ). Born in Chicago,Cisneros has lived in Mexico andTexas; she focuses on the large culturalborder between Mexico andthe United States as a creative,contradictory zone in whichMexican-American women mustreinvent themselves. Her best-sellingThe House on Mango Street(1984), a series of interlockingvignettes told from a young girl’sviewpoint, blazed the trail for otherLatina writers and introduced readersto the vital Chicago barrio.LARRY MCMURTRYPhoto © Richard RobinsonCisneros extended her vignettes ofChicana women’s lives in WomanHollering Creek (1991). Pat Mora(1942- ) offers a Chicana view inNepantla: Essays From the Land inthe Middle (1993), which addressesissues of cultural conservation.Native Americans from theregion include the late JamesWelch, whose The Heartsong ofCharging Elk (2000) imagines ayoung Sioux who survives the Battleof Little Bighorn and makes a life inFrance. Linda Hogan (l947- ), fromColorado and of Chickasaw heritage,reflects on Native-Americanwomen and nature in novels includingMean Spirit (1990), about the oilrush on Indian lands in the 1920s,and Power (1998), in which anIndian woman discovers her owninner natural resources.The SouthwestFor centuries, the desertSouthwest developed underSpanish rule, and much of the populationcontinues to speak Spanish,while some Native-American tribesreside on ancestral lands. Rainfallis unreliable, and agriculture hasalways been precarious in theregion. Today, massive irrigationprojects have boosted agriculturalproduction, and air conditioningattracts more and more people tosprawling cities like Salt Lake Cityin Utah and Phoenix in Arizona.In a region where the desertecology is so fragile, it is not surprisingthat there are many environmentallyoriented writers. Theactivist Edward Abbey (1927-1989)148