During the two decades between the world wars, artists and intellectuals across the United States awakened to cultural and political possibilities that they believed to be inherent in the regional diversity of America. This book is an attempt to understand their motivations and expectations, and to trace the fortunes of the movement that they launched for the utopian reconstruction of modern civilization.

The careers and ideas of four figures of monumental importance in the history of American conservation--George Perkins Marsh, Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, and John Wesley Powell--are explored in A Word for Nature. Robert Dorman offers lively portraits of each of these early environmental advocates, who witnessed firsthand the impact of economic expansion and industrial revolution on fragile landscapes from the forests of New England to the mountains...