Cactus Ed's Readin List

[Steelhead]

Foax, this here is the reading list of the dearly departed Ed Abbey, as
transcribed in the humorous introduction to his collection of Luddite hit
pieces, Down the River, circa 1981. Over to you, Ed.

"Reviewers may note that I include two book reviews of my own in this
assemblage. The reasons are two: (1) to indulge a weakness for malicious
mischief at the expense of a pair of over inflated reputations [ie., Robert
Pirsig and Paul Horgan], always a healthy exercise for the amatuer critic,
and (2) to prepare the way for a salute to those among contemporary
American novelists whom I truly admire, such as William Gaddis, Thomas
Pynchon, Don DeLillo, Robert Coover, Kurt Vonnegut, EL Doctorow, Gilbert
Sorrentino, William Kotzwinkle, Thomas Berger, Joseph Heller, Wallace
Stegner, Robert Stone, Joseph McElroy, and others I have mentioned before.
Missing from my list are a number of well-known names. I am aware of the
omission and can only explain it in this way: although the others among
current writers are gifted, much esteemed, earnest, and industrious fellows
[Abbey was an unrepentant sexist; his exchanges with Steinam are much
funnier than Mailer's], they uniformly lack (it seems to me) those powers
of imaginative technique, intensity of vision, and high moral
purpose--concern for right and wrong, justice and injustice, truth and
falsehood, beauty and ugliness--that form and inform the work of those I
most respect.

"Meanwhile, back to the river. On with the river, day by day, down to the
ultimate sea. Shall we gather at the river? Why not? One more river one
more time. And then no more. And then tat ancient river must flow right on
down without me."

Steely