The Driftless Land

by Kevin Koch

The Driftless Land, a collection of essays by Kevin Koch, is a search for the spirit of place among the bluffs, woodlands, and prairies of the Upper Mississippi River valley. The Midwest is commonly known for its flatlands, for oceans of corn pressing towards the horizon beneath a big sky. Lesser known are the steep hills and bluffs, the ravines and towering rock outcroppings where the upper Mississippi carves its meandering path. These rugged lands amid the prairies are known as The Driftless Area, a 20,000 square-mile region of northeast Iowa, northwest Illinois, southeast Minnesota, and southwest and central Wisconsin, bypassed by most of the glaciers. Koch observes, “You can ‘love nature’ and ‘love the land’—but you won’t know place until you’ve walked slowly and attentively through Lost Canyon or the Kickapoo Valley Reserve or Swiss Valley or Trempealeau Mountain, and then returned to learn what you can about them.” Hidden within the woodlands are the imprints of human history and the deeper geological story as well, the story of a land untouched by the ancient onslaught of leveling glaciers. The result is a call to know place deeply, whatever place you inhabit.

Genres: Nonfiction

212 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2010

Reviews

[K Kriesel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've loved Galena my entire life, and only just began to hear the term "Driftless" within the past few years. Koch's essays articulate much of my admiration of the area, a few pages in I thought "I'm not the only one who feels this way!"

[Lesley · Rating 2 out of 5]

Reading these essays provided some good information about the area that I didn't know, but I found the author's writing style very irritating and generally not enjoyable.

[William Hogan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredibly enjoyable book specifically about the Driftless Area--the land not flattened by glaciers--of Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois and Minnesota, but Koch's thoughts on 'place' and 'home' really apply to anywhere.

Koch's love of the natural world is apparent in every essay, as is his sense of 'home' and the responsibility that comes with that sense.

It's difficult to point to which of these essays I enjoyed the most. Some are natural history--i.e. glaciers, prairie, woodlands; and some are human history--the centuries of Native Americans and later the pioneers, settlers, and the U.S. Army. All of the essays are enjoyable.

Land the glaciers couldn't creep over was later swept over by waves of humans.

These are wonderful essays on nature and our place in it, and, while written in the early part of the 21st Century, they are especially important in these current times.

I can't say enough about how much I loved this book, and the fact that I was reading it at my son's house in the Driftless Area itself, made it even more poignant.