Peter Matthiessen on Wildpeople
Posted by: Loren Coleman on October 5th, 2007
Peter Matthiessen, who is perhaps best known for his books The Snow Leopard (1978) and In the Spirit of Crazy Horse (1983), will be speaking in Idaho on October 19, on the topic “A Naturalist’s Impressions of the Wildman.” He will be sharing his insights about Yeti and Sasquatch, in a lecture arranged by anthropologist Jeff Meldrum.
Those who have closely read In the Spirit of Crazy Horse recall that Matthiessen talked of the Dakota/Lakota traditions and encounters with their “Big Men,” the local moniker for the Sasquatch.
Peter Matthiessen (b. May 22, 1927, New York City) is an American naturalist and author of some repute for his historical fiction and non-fiction, having penned over 30 books.
Matthiessen is also celebrated as a literary visionary, although there is a revealing new backstory. Along with George Plimpton, Harold Humes, Thomas Guinzburg and Donald Hall, he founded the literary magazine The Paris Review in 1953. In Doc about Harold Humes, a documentary that premiered in November 2006, by an Oscar-nominated filmmaker (one of Mr. Humes’s daughters), Peter Matthiessen admits publicly for the first time that he was a young C.I.A. recruit at the time he helped start the magazine, and used it as his cover.
See below for the poster of the upcoming event, which should be quite interesting:
Please click on image for larger version.
- Similar Phenomena:
sounds interesting. He also looks a little familiar. oh, well, who knows these days.
Great Naturalist and Author, wish i could attend.
I agree, I’d love to be there. Oh well.
Is that a lakota shaman mask?
I too would love to hear Matthiessen speak on this subject, or on nearly any subject. His book “the Dry Tortugas” should be included among his recommended work. His taking our consciousness for an interesting walk where nature’s patterns overwhelm the reasoning power of our limited experience is a journey into the intersection of wild and self.
Is there some reason that a lecture like this wouldn’t be recorded by the local sponsoring organization and made available for later viewing? It would seem to be in keeping with the support it recieves from public funds and the existence of the inernet and web-sites like google video seem to make an offering like that a natural.