Emma Marris

I’ve done a few radio programs to promote the book, and thanks to the magic of the internet, that formerly ephemeral medium now has some kind of permanence. If you are interested in learning more about the ideas in the book while you do the dishes or walk the dog, I recommend the following interviews and programs.

• A great 28-minute conversation with Gene Bradley of Portland’s KBOO. We had the space here to really dig into the ideas; Mr. Bradley was a very thorough interviewer and a bit of a convert to my point of view, which was exciting for me.
• For those of you with green thumbs, this fun, freewheeling gardening hour on Weekday, a program on Seattle’s KUOW, is a great introduction to how my ideas apply to your backyard. I share the hour with host Steve Scher and Northwest gardening guru Marty Wingate, who knows a hell of a lot more about horticulture than I likely ever will! (She’s got a book coming out about Landscaping for Privacy that looks very cozy. I’ve often daydreamed of creating a little secret garden to hide out in in the midst of the busy city.)
• Harvest Public Media‘s Jessica Naudziunas created a very nice produced piece about the book. Naudziunas is a local Columbia, Missouri-based journalist and a rising public radio star; her piece on a national peanut shortage was recently featured on All Things Considered. In eight minutes, this piece manages to capture one of the book’s main messages: love the nature around you; don’t yearn for the unattainable perfection of mythical pure wilderness that you never have time or money to visit. Features great sound of my local chorus of late summer bugs.

There’s more great radio to come, so stay tuned!

Are coming in. Publisher’s Weekly says the book is “a stimulating examination of the questions of stewardship and the future of our delicate planet that will challenge any simple answers.” And the Reason magazine says “This gracefully written and well-argued book deserves a wide readership. One hopes that readers will take to heart Marris’ chief insight about conservation: ‘There is no one best goal.’”

The book comes out September first!

Two upcoming radio appearances to mention. Tomorrow, Friday August 11th, during the noon hour (Pacific time) I will appear on The Conversation with Ross Reynolds on KUOW in Seattle. That is 94.9 on your FM dial or www.kuow.org. I will be talking mostly about my recent essay in Nature about the 40th anniversary of The Lorax.

Then, on September 1st, the day Rambunctious Garden comes out, I’ll be on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Here on Earth. That airs live at 3 PM central and again at 9 PM central on the Ideas Network of Wisconsin Public Radio. You can also hear it at 7 PM Mountain on Idaho’s Boise State Radio. Or, listen online during the live broadcast here, or later by clicking on the program in the archive.

The Madrona Woods, by Bryn Nelson

Last week I walked through a Seattle greenspace–the Madrona Woods–with journalist Bryn Nelson. The steep wooded area has been adopted by the neighborhood. They’ve pulled out many exotic species and planted many natives. The result is a quasi-garden that pays homage to the beautiful native flora of the Northwest, provides habitat for wildlife like eagles, and a natural space for urban Seattleites.

The result of our chat was a Q&A for the New York Times’ Green Blog, which I think turned out quite well, thanks to Nelson’s skill with questioning, editing and scene setting.

Check it out and leave a comment!

Previews aren’t just for movies these days. I decided to jump on the book trailer bandwagon and see if I could distill the book down to two and a half minutes. I failed. The trailer is just over four minutes, and I wish I could have fit more in. I filmed it on a humid day here in Columbia, MO in a little scrap of untended land I walk by on a regular basis on my way to the lake. Columbia’s Boxcar Films did the videography and editing. The photos were taken by me and my husband, who accompanied me on some of my research trips, in part because I was pregnant and needed an assistant to keep feeding me snacks every two hours.

Charles Mann’s 1491 is a must-read account of how Indians ran North and South America before Columbus. He now has another book coming out, 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created, about the enduring consequences of cultural and ecological exchange after Columbus. Here’s what he has to say about my book:

“For two decades or more ecology and conservation has been racked by a
profound but largely hidden dispute over a simple-sounding question:
what is nature? Billions have been spent in the name of restoring
wilderness and protecting the natural world, but a growing number of
scientists question one of the foundations of the ecological movement
– what we are trying to save. Emma Marris charts the fault lines of
the dispute, which may literally shape the kind of planet our children
live in. I’m sure I am not the only reader of Rambunctious Garden who
will fill its margins with exclamation points and scribbled notes.”

–Charles C. Mann