Desert, Garden, Margin, Range: Literature on the American Frontier

by Eric Heyne

The mystique surrounding the volatile American frontier has left an indelible mark on our national consciousness. Basic features of the American self-image--such as rugged individualism, unlimited potential for growth, radical democracy, and six-gun law and order--grew out of the westward movement, and still shape our culture today, one hundred years after Frederick Jackson Turner and the Census Bureau proclaimed the frontier "closed." Whether viewed as a wasteland or a paradise, the narrow edge of civilization or a vast spread of open territory, the frontier has never failed to fire our imaginations and fuel our endeavors. The best American writers have always built upon and simultaneously questioned this intimate relationship.

182 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1992