The Hopes of Snakes
City Wilds: Essays and Stories About Urban Nature
American Nature Writing, 2000
The Mountain Reader
American Nature Writing 1998
The River Reader
Grrr . . . Poems About Bears
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The Hopes of Snakes
(Beacon Press, 2005)
The Hopes of Snakes and Other Tales from the Urban Landscape
Booklist
It is hard to imagine there is Nature (with a capital N) in the urban megalopolis exemplified by Manhattan and Washington, D.C. True, at times it must be sought with a discerning eye. Couturier is an artist at discovering little bits of Nature in the city. She speaks of feathers as heirlooms, of how these ultimate symbols of flight represent the essence of bird and become treasures and memories of birds she has known. Rivers run through the narrative, including the once filthy but newly fecund East River and the storied Potomac, with its monuments and beavers. One essay describes the feeling of safety the author gets while in the woods; another tells of following flocks of crows and discovering their winter roosts. Woven through Couturier’s explorations are the inevitable impacts of humans and their works, but the author sees the connections between humans and nature even in the most blighted landscapes.
”Lisa Couturier's essays shine with her candor, her perception, and her affection for the creatures of our world, especially with their difficult encounters on our endless roads and in our inhospitable towns and cities. Whether the subject is a snake or a falcon or a crow named Edgar, these essays will both enlighten and give much reading pleasure.”
--Mary Oliver
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