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A natural act
David Quammen shares thoughts about nature and the West
by Carol Schmidt |
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David Quammen is the award-winning author of 11 books and numerous essays on science, nature, and conservation. One of a handful of contemporary writers who has elevated the art of science writing, the Bozeman-based Quammen is a contributing writer for National Geographic. Quammen soon begins his third semester as the Wallace Stegner Professor of Western American Studies at Montana State University, also known as the Stegner Chair.
A 59-year-old native of Cincinnati, Quammen graduated from Yale, where he studied under Robert Penn Warren. He also studied the works of William Faulkner at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. He moved to Montana in the 1970s and Bozeman in 1984. He has written for National Geographic, Outside, Harper's, The Atlantic, Rolling Stone, and The New York Times Book Review. From 1981 to 1995 he wrote the column "Natural Acts" for Outside magazine. He has received the National Magazine Award three times, and is also a Guggenheim Fellowship recipient.
In between trips to Kenya to write about elephants for National Geographic, Quammen answered a few questions for Mountains and Minds about the Stegner Chair, the future of the environment, and upcoming projects.
You've kayaked down the Colorado, skied in Romania, tracked tigers in the Russian Far East. How does one land such a great job?
DQ: Well, it's not actually a job, it's a literary niche. I paid dues as a writer for a long time, developing some expertise here and there, and a certain reputation among editors and readers for delivering a certain sort of story at a certain level of quality. Now I have the luxury of more work opportunities being offered than I can accept. Mostly I do my magazine work for National Geographic and Harper's these days, and they allow me to see and think about amazing corners of the world. But there's no security in the life of a free-lance writer. I bust my gut and risk my life to offer a form of literary product for which, at the moment, there are buyers. When you can't deliver the goods, the quality, the freshness, the edge -- you're done.
How did you come to be selected for the Wallace Stegner Professor in Western American Studies at MSU? While most of your work has dealt with more universal, rather than Western themes, what appealed to you about this position honoring the Dean of Western Writers?
I believe deeply in what MSU does for the state of Montana.in bringing rigor and challenge to this region.
--David Quammen |
DQ: Brett Walker, chairman of the MSU history department, and Gordon Brittan, MSU Regents Professor and project leader for the Stegner Chair, spoke to me about the Stegner Chair and what would be expected, what sort of duties and opportunities would be involved. They made clear that they wanted a writer and a teacher, someone with a mix of skills and interests, in the spirit of Wallace Stegner himself. I had met Stegner one time, he was a lovely man, but he hadn't been a mentor to me, as he had to other writers here in the West. Robert Penn Warren was my mentor. Another important influence and friend was Hughes Rudd, the CBS correspondent and short-story writer, who had come out of Waco, Texas. I cut my teeth on the literature of the American South and came here to the West as a 25- year-old published (barely) novelist. I owe back. Brett and Gordon were comfortable with what I could bring to the job, and I was fascinated enough by this different kind of challenge to give it a try. I've never aspired to be a teacher in the formal academic sense, but at the same time, I do feel a strong inclination to communicate my ideas, my interests, my concerns, and maybe some aspects of the craft of writing, not just to readers but to younger people.
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