Mossback - by David Michael Pritchett (Paperback)

About the Book

"In Mossback, David Michael Pritchett seeks to celebrate those who move so deliberately through the natural world that they can fully observe, appreciate, and ultimately become a part of it. Mossbacks carry their environment on their backs instead of subjugating it to human will and motive. Pritchett's essays traverse a variety of terrains, exploring landscapes and mythologies at the intersection of environmental, indigenous, and social justice. From the heart of the swamp to the modern gridlines remaking our watersheds, he uses geography, history, genealogy, and story to search for glimpses of light in dark places and hope in painful legacies"--

Book Synopsis

In Mossback, David Pritchett traverses geography, history, and genealogy to explore landscapes and mythologies at the intersection of environmental, indigenous, and social justice. This collection of a dozen essays searches terrain--from the heart of a swamp to the modern grid lines remaking our watersheds, to the tracks of the animals who share this earth, to the inner landscapes of the soul--to find glimpses of light in dark places and hope in painful legacies.

Pritchett recounts a trip to Dismal Swamp, where he takes inspiration from the many enslaved people who found refuge there. Another piece offers two ways of seeing the landscape: the watershed as an ecological unit, and the grid as a colonial construct. Still another weaves personal narrative with the story of the Trail of Tears to describe how settler colonialism became an apocalypse for indigenous nations and ecologies. Pritchett explores an early apocalyptic story from the book of Daniel and considers new ways of relating to the land and its inhabitants. He focuses on the relationship between technology and trees to argue that humans have largely discarded ecological interrelationship in favor of extractive ways of living, and he travels the Ventura River, reflecting on waterways as being endangered but still operating as places of refuge for people and wildlife.

The word "mossback" has been used to describe rural southerners who lived in swampy areas during colonial times and moved so slowly that moss grew on their clothing. It is also used to describe fish and turtles who show similar growth on their shells, Confederate deserters who refused to fight and, after the war, southerners who fought against the Ku Klux Klan. Pritchett reclaims the word to celebrate those who move deliberately through the natural world, protecting the land and the relations they depend on.

Review Quotes

"An eclectic collection of essays on racism, colonialism, and the environment...Detailing his travels to places 'human culture has not conquered, ' including Death Valley, the Ozarks, and Mount Hood in Oregon, Pritchett uses 'myth, memory, history, and ecology' to outline 'ways of seeing the world' that privilege ecological and social justice...illuminates alternative ways of relating to the natural world." -- Publishers Weekly

"Mossback is a beautiful meander through place and time, and an interweaving of authentic personal stories with the stories of others, including Welsh bardic poets, contemporary and ancient theologians, mystics, biologists, Greek philosophers, and indigenous elders. Pritchett takes readers from the swamplands of Virginia to the mountains of Africa and back, returning again and again to the most important question of our time--how will we change the way we live on and with the earth and with each other?" -- Gretchen Legler, author of Woodsqueer: Crafting a Sustainable Rural Life

About the Author

J. Drew Lanham is a birder, naturalist, hunter-conservationist, and poet. He is the author of Sparrow Envy: Field Guide to Birds and Lesser Beasts and The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man's Love Affair with Nature, and his work has appeared in Audubon, Orion, Vanity Fair, Forest Ecology and Management, and the Oxford American. The recipient of a 2022 MacArthur fellowship, he is Alumni Distinguished Professor of Wildlife Ecology at Clemson University in South Carolina.