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Show 390 linking Hetch Hetchy to Yosemite, and Alaska to Yosemite, using the language of Yosemite for other landscapes. Perhaps because many of his essays in Picturesque California were hastily written summaries of earlier, richer narratives, he was writing about too much in too little compass, and of course his experiences were flat when reduced to the bare bones; they appeared almost superficial. In his essay "Yosemite Valley," for instance, he hustled the reader through Sierran forests, Sequoia groves, all the major falls in the Valley, the source of Yosemite Creek, lunar rainbows, the views from Sentinel Dome and Glacier Point, as ascent of Half Dome, the seasons in the Valley, avalanches, snow banners, wildlife, the Hetch Hetchy Valley and its falls, and finally ended up in the Kings River Yosemite. He was beginning to sound like one of those literary racers he had once laughed at. On the other hand, Picturesque California allowed Muir to manage some good syntheses of material which had been spread, and lost during the seventies. His essay on the Shasta region put together his previously dispersed material into a unified whole. This was the best article he ever wrote on Shasta, and gave a nice sense of the wholeness of the region which surrounded the grand fire mountain. Further, he was beginning to discover that he could use a collection of near views, as he did when dealing with Yosemite Falls. In this section of an otherwise rambling essay, he put together his views from the top, bottom, and behind the Yosemite Fall, into a thorough narrative of one man's attempt to approach |
