The Meaning of Rivers

The Meaning of Rivers
Author: T. S. McMillin
Publisher: University of Iowa Press
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2011-03-15
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 158729978X


Download The Meaning of Rivers Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle

In the continental United States, rivers serve to connect state to state, interior with exterior, the past to the present, but they also divide places and peoples from one another. These connections and divisions have given rise to a diverse body of literature that explores American nature, ranging from travel accounts of seventeenth-century Puritan colonists to magazine articles by twenty-first-century enthusiasts of extreme sports. Using pivotal American writings to determine both what literature can tell us about rivers and, conversely, how rivers help us think about the nature of literature, The Meaning of Rivers introduces readers to the rich world of flowing water and some of the different ways in which American writers have used rivers to understand the world through which these waters flow. Embracing a hybrid, essayistic form—part literary theory, part cultural history, and part fieldwork—The Meaning of Rivers connects the humanities to other disciplines and scholarly work to the land. Whether developing a theory of palindromes or reading works of American literature as varied as Henry David Thoreau's A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers and James Dickey’s Deliverance, McMillin urges readers toward a transcendental retracing of their own interpretive encounters. The nature of texts and the nature of “nature” require diverse and versatile interpretation; interpretation requires not only depth and concentration but also imaginative thinking, broad-mindedness, and engaged connection-making. By taking us upstream as well as down, McMillin draws attention to the potential of rivers for improving our sense of place and time.


The Meaning of Rivers
Language: en
Pages: 241
Authors: T. S. McMillin
Categories: Literary Criticism
Type: BOOK - Published: 2011-03-15 - Publisher: University of Iowa Press

GET EBOOK

In the continental United States, rivers serve to connect state to state, interior with exterior, the past to the present, but they also divide places and peopl
What Is a River?
Language: en
Pages: 48
Authors: Monika Vaicenavičiene
Categories: Juvenile Nonfiction
Type: BOOK - Published: 2020-02-12 - Publisher: Enchanted Lion Books

GET EBOOK

A river is a thread, embroidering our world. This non-fiction picture book brings attention to the rivers that stitch and thread our world together.
River Dynamics
Language: en
Pages: 544
Authors: Bruce L. Rhoads
Categories: Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2020-04-29 - Publisher: Cambridge University Press

GET EBOOK

Rivers are important agents of change that shape the Earth's surface and evolve through time in response to fluctuations in climate and other environmental cond
Reading Rivers in Roman Literature and Culture
Language: en
Pages: 148
Authors: Prudence J. Jones
Categories: Literary Criticism
Type: BOOK - Published: 2005 - Publisher: Lexington Books

GET EBOOK

Reading Rivers is the first book in a new series: Roman Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches. Author Prudence Jones examines rivers as a literary phenomenon, p
River Science at the U.S. Geological Survey
Language: en
Pages: 206
Authors: National Research Council
Categories: Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2007-04-24 - Publisher: National Academies Press

GET EBOOK

Rivers provide about 60 percent of the nation's drinking water and irrigation water and 10 percent of the nation's electric power needs. The multiple and someti