adventure of a dad and his nine year old son in the earlys living in a cabin outside of Seward, Alaska, They made incredible memories together in the winter with the snow , the rain and the wind, Little Rockwell grew to love Fox Island bu exploring the lake, mountain, beach, and taking baths in the snow, Rockwell Kent was an adventurous man, a hard worker, and a great artist, This book was an escape from a busy life to serene cabin living, I could vision being on Fox Island with the eagles, magpies, porcupines, cutting wood and painting the gorgeous views, Wild earth as self, as reflection, InKent, illustrator among other things of the most beautiful edition of MobyDick, spent six months roughing it on Fox Island in Alaska's maritime wilderness with hisyearold son, Rockwell III.
This book, adapted from his journal entries, is, mostly on account of Rockwell III, quite possibly my favorite along with McPhee's "Coming into the Country" of the many bookstranscendental, survivalist, sociological, satiricalthat outsiders have written about their Alaskan adventures.
"We came to this new land, a boy and a man, entirely on a dreamer's search," Kent writes, What distinguishes him from other travelers who'd dreamed of a "Northern Paradise" is the way in which he tried, and in some ways succeeded, to reconcile painting and adventuring with fatherhood.
As for the son, fifty years later, now a balding, sixfootfour biologist, Rockwell the Younger would tell his father that the "year we spent together on Fox Island was the happiest of all my life," or so his father reports in the preface to theedition.
In their one room cabin, they shared everything, They slept in the same bed, They cleared trees together, cut firewood together, iceskated together, "holding hands like sweethearts, " For entertainment, Kent brought along a small library of books, and at bedtime, by lamplight, he would read to his son from "Robinson Crusoe" or "Treasure Island" or the fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen.
Aptly subtitled, Kent's book records genuine moments of danger, but little of the testosteroneaddled, manversuswild drama one usually encounters in louder adventure narratives, and when those moments of danger do arise, Rockwell the younger responds to them in poignantly childish ways.
The woodcuts and drawings that Rockwell the elder produced during his Alaskan retreat, and which illustrate "Wilderness," are far more moving to me than the landscapes that inspired them.
What makes them moving isn't the landscapes, per se, but the human figures whose inner lives the landscapes serve to dramatize, As winter sets in, so does disenchantment, Kent looks to "the sun going down with a kind of dread, " He grows desperately lonely: "I have moments, hours, days of homesick despondency, " One gets the impression that without the company of his son, Kent's lonely thoughts that winter might have turned, as they had in the past, suicidal.
One also gets the impression that without animal playmates, the younger Kent might have gone bonkers too,
Just as little Rockwell delights in the local flora and fauna, elder Rockwell delights in his son, who increasingly becomes the journals main subject.
What Kent discovers on Fox Island isn't mainly the transporting beauty of Alaska but the poignant beauty of his son,
review adapted from endnotes to my book, "MobyDuck: The True Story of,Bath Toys Lost at Sea and of the Beachcombers, Oceanographers, Environmentalists and Fools, Including
the Author, Who Went in Search of Them.
" A mustread for anyone going to the Seward/Resurrection Bay Area! I read this to prep for my trip to Alaska,
Thanks to Rockwell's descriptive paragraphs, illustrations, and anecdotes about the area, I feel like I've been there already!,liked it
"The still, deep cup of the wilderness is potent with wisdom, "
A simply written and heartfelt diary of Artist, Rockwell Kent, who, with hisyearold son, spend AugustMarchsettled in a primitive cabin on Fox Island in Resurrection Bay, Alaska from where they embark in relaxing activities, including painting/drawing, reading, and exploring their natural surroundings by land and by sea.
In so doing, they strengthen their bond and find themselves:
"It seems that we have both together by chance turned out of the beaten, crowded way and come to stand face to face with that infinite and unfathomable thing which is the wilderness and here we have found OURSELVESfor the wilderness is nothing else.
It is a kind of living mirror that gives back as its own all and only all that the imagination of a man brings to it.
It is that which we believe it to be, So here we have stood, we two, and if we have not shuddered at the emptiness of the abyss and fled from its loneliness, it is because of the wealth of our own souls that filled the void with imagery, warmed it, and gave it speech and understanding.
This vast, wild land we have made a childs world and a mans, " I picked this book up when I was in Seward, Alaska working on my dissertation research in, I didn't have the chance to read it then, but just finished it, Its the story of a printmaker and painter who takes hisyear old son to Alaska to live an adventure formonths in, It was a really interesting and fun read and had bonus illustrations by the author, A new paperback edition of Kent's first book, often referred to as Alaska's Walden,
In AugustRockwell Kent and hisyearold son settled into a primitive cabin on an island near Seward, Alaska, Kent, who during the next three decades became America's premier graphic artist, printmaker, and illustrator, was seeking time, peace, and solitude to work on his art and strengthen ties with his son.
This reissue of the journal chronicling theirmonth odyssey describes what Kent called an adventure of the spirit, He soon discovers how deeply he is stirred by simple happenings in a quiet world as man and boy face both the mundane and the magnificent: satisfaction in simple chores like woodchopping or baking the appalling gloom of long and lonely winter nights hours of silence while each works at his drawings crystalline moonlight glancing off a frozen lake killer whales cavorting in their bay.
Richly illustrated by Kent's drawings, the journal vividly recreates that sense of great height and space both external and internal at the same time that it celebrates a wilderness now nearly lost to us.
Beautiful trip. Detailed descriptions. almost could feel being there, I enjoyed this story very much, Loved this story, the illustrations, and a journey back in time to a place I've never explored, Lovely journal with a number of illustrations and pictures, I also found it historically interesting, Doug Capra, a local writer, has written more about Rockwell Kent and the community of Seward, for example in his book "The Spaces Between", and his excerpts helped to put more things into context.
This is a journal that Rockwell Kent kept of his sojourn in Fox Island, Alaska, formonths, from Augustto March, He had gone there in a last ditch effort to save his career, find his art, as it were, along with hisyear old son, also named Rockwell.
He chose Alaska because he "craved snowtopped mountains" and because he "loved the north, " Large swathes of the journal are about his quotidian tasks, which he referred to as "humble housewifely duties," such as baking, washing, mending, cooking, We definitely get a sense of his life there and parts of it are dull, It rains a lot. It's a small island and there isn't much to do, He plays the flute, he reads, he paints, he cuts wood, What leavens the journal are his drawings, absolutely gorgeous, as well as his writings about his host, an old Swede named Lars Mann Olson, I loved Olson. He personifies the adventurer and we learn that he has done just about everything from prospecting for gold to now running a fox and goat farm.
He is described as "noting bott a broken down freunters man, ”
It was an easy read, sometimes tedious, but always there were the drawings and I looked forward to hearing Olson's stories as told by Kent.
One does get a very clear picture of what we now call 'offgrid' living in Alaska, It is not an easy life, for sure, His son, Rockwell, is an engaging young boy who never seems to be bored, I loved the description of their Christmas together and the menu!
But most of all, I loved that Kent adored Alaska, These are his words: “America offers nothing to the tourist but the wonders of its natural scenery, . the night is beautiful beyond thought, All the bay is flooded with moonlight and in that pale glow the snowy mountains appear whiter than snow itself, . Fox island will soon become in our memories like a dream or vision, a remote experience too wonderful, . . to be remembered or believed in as a real experience in life, It was for us life as it should be, serene and wholesome, "
It made me want to pack my bags and head north, .