Arthur Heming (1870–1940)

This book was kicking around my place for years; I just assumed it was one of the "nature" books for children I still have with me, and kept moving it aside. But no, it's a real ragpaper book from "the day" that I acquired I know not how or when, and it's a serious piece of wilderness writing. Were it not an admitted pastiche of events the author (and illustrator) had experienced or heard reliably about, it could be called nonfiction, yet it is at its core a nonfiction book, true to life. The book describes the barbarian and cruel practices of trapping and hunting, practices which continue to this day, but I cannot deny the fascination with the lifestyle. People would have starved, in some cases. But to get back to this work as a work of literature and not as social commentary, the author uses these pages to decry white or "civilised" society in favour of the philosophically more honest and richer rural life, the wilderness life to be precise, and asks who is the more honest, more pure, human? Heming also adds a nice fictional flare for the mystery ending, baiting us all through the narrative with the puzzle of the Son In Law. The book also provides many practical concepts that I would take to the bank--how to tell which way was north in a snowstorm or pitch black, how to make this or that... A wonderful read.… (mehr)