Present Books Toward Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water
| Original Title: | Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water |
| ISBN: | 0140178244 (ISBN13: 9780140178241) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Literary Awards: | National Book Critics Circle Award Nominee for General Nonfiction (1986) |
Marc Reisner
Paperback | Pages: 582 pages Rating: 4.26 | 8471 Users | 736 Reviews
Mention Appertaining To Books Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water
| Title | : | Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water |
| Author | : | Marc Reisner |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | Revised Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 582 pages |
| Published | : | June 1st 1993 by Penguin (first published 1986) |
| Categories | : | Nonfiction. History. Environment. Science. Politics |
Narration As Books Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water
The story of the American West is the story of a relentless quest for a precious resource: water. It is a tale of rivers diverted and dammed, of political corruption and intrigue, of billion-dollar battles over water rights, of ecologic and economic disaster. In Cadillac Desert Marc Reisner writes of the earliest settlers, lured by the promise of paradise, and of the ruthless tactics employed by Los Angeles politicians and business interests to ensure the city's growth. He documents the bitter rivalry between two government giants, the Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, in the competition to transform the West.Based on more than a decade of research, Cadillac Desert is a stunning expose and a dramatic, intriguing history of the creation of an Eden—an Eden that may be only a mirage.
Rating Appertaining To Books Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water
Ratings: 4.26 From 8471 Users | 736 ReviewsJudge Appertaining To Books Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water
This was a really, really interesting book. I picked it up, without knowing much about it, because I knew it had been influential in the American environmentalist movement. The focus is on water development, especially dam building, and particularly on water development in the American West and Midwest. It looks at how water policy has effected, over time, an upward redistribution of wealth and power from small family farms to wealthy and corporate farming operations, and at the environmental
if this doesn't make you want to take Los Angeles and associated farmland and dump it in the ocean - nothing will. Great history of water development in the west.
What a book. Its dense and involved and took me forever to read, but it has fundamentally changed the way I view the American West. And Reisners writing is entertaining as hell.
Some required retroactive expectation management: Marc Reisner was a journalist, writing for a general audience. Much like Charles Mann and Pollan and other pop-non-fiction writers from the journalistic world, he was less concerned with thorough documentation than he was with persuasion and exposition (even though few things are more persuasive than accurate documentation and logical analysis). With that in mind, I should not have been so utterly enraged by the nearly complete absence of direct
Why not a fifth star?"I don't know. That doesn't make sense to me."Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL), on whether New Orleans should be rebuilt in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Sept. 2, 2005Because as important and well written as this book is, it is pervaded by a few theoretical flaws in its rhetorical portion. The factual reporting and research are impeccable and at this point, this book is famous in its own right and it deserves that. But:(1) The Naturalistic Fallacy. If humans do not belong in
As California sweats through a fourth year of drought I thought it might be a good time to read this history of water development in the American West. Although it is often hailed as an environmental classic, Cadillac Desert can also read as a jeremiad against big government. While Reisner does spend some time on the environmental consequences of America's century of dam building and large-scale crop irrigation, what really gets his blood pumping is the corruption and fiscal stupidity of it all.
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