Goodreads Bookshelf
Book Review: The Gift of Good Land by Wendell Berry
The Gift of Good Land collects a number of essays from the late '70s and early '80s, as the sub-title says, "Further Essays Cultural and Agricultural." The heart of this collection is Berry's analysis of American culture through the lens of its connection--or lack thereof--to the land. Berry favors small, subsistence farmers over "agribusiness" or "tractor jockeys" farming monoculture crops. The collection, however, has a broader appeal than simply to those interested in farming.
The first two essays, occupying 76 pages, were basically travelogues, Berry describing trips to Peru and the southwestern U.S. to see indigenous subsistence farming practices. Unfortunately, both of these essays were, to my taste, too little bang for the buck, and they really slowed my reading of this book because they didn't particularly excite me.
The middle section of the book, though, is filled with incisive, insightful essays. These are perfect gems closely analyzing important questions about cultural and agricultural issues in America. I won't reproduce here all the passages that I marked to come back to, but I won't be surprised if some of them inspire future blog entries. Even almost three decades later, his essays have power and relevence, in some cases because he was writing against the dominant practices of conventional agriculture just as they were becoming dominant, and in some cases because our energy and economic situation now reflects the concerns of the '70s (and then some).
The late section builds on this theoretical framework with profiles of small, diversified farmers in various parts of the country, detailing their histories and methods, and is fascinating in its own right. The final--title--essay wasn't quite as compelling for me, as it was "a Biblical argument for ecological and agricultural responsibility." It held some interest, but 1) I don't need to be convinced and 2) Biblical sources wouldn't be the way to convince me if I did. Still, the collection as a whole was well worth reading.