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Anonymous
Posted June 10, 2001
¿Every morning I wake up and ask myself whether I should write a book or blow up a dam,¿ writes Jensen in his opening pages. ¿Every day I tell myself I should continue to write. Yet I¿m not always convinced I¿m making the right decision.¿ This is the agony of an environmentalist and a pacifist who has come to realize that he¿s been throwing snowballs at army tanks. While he debates and negotiates with the polluters, the developers and the industrialists, they continue their destructive activities virtually unimpeded. How long, wonders Jensen, can we afford to go on being pacifists? ¿Scientists study, politicians and businesspeople lie and delay, activists write letters and press releases, I write books and articles, and still the salmon die. It¿s a cozy relationship for all of us except the salmon.¿ Jensen, whether he realizes it or not, is the philosopher-king of the deep ecology movement. In this provocative and insightful book, he shows us that deep ecology is truly deep, not the shallow feel-good wishful thinking of the New Agers who too often represent the movement. Drawing on personal experience, anecdotal evidence, historical examples, and philosophical thought from the early sophists to Descartes, Jensen helps his readers peer over the tops of our cultural eyeglasses. He invites us to gaze at the world unfiltered by our shared myths and illusions about human progress. The earth is dying. We are the cause. We can stop it, but first we will have to begin talking about some subjects we¿ve all agreed never to talk about. One of Jensen¿s most effective tools is the use of his personal experience as an abused child as both a metaphor and an object lesson on the process we all go through in order to distance ourselves from the pain we endure and the damage we do simply by living in a ¿civilized¿ industrial society. Yet Jensen manages to open our eyes without using a pry bar. With self-deprecating humor, he chats with us in the amiable tones of an old friend sharing a beer on the back porch. This is powerful stuff delivered in an affable package. Highly recommended reading. So dangerous it could change your life¿and maybe even your behavior.
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted February 8, 2001
In the midst of a pile of papers and books I need to be reading for Graduate School, I couldn't put this book down - It is life changing. 'What you value is what you create' -Now there's something to think about. When you're done thinking about that, step back and take a look at our culture - remember that quote...if this doesn't scare you, take a look around, you may need to get reconnected to Mother Earth and her gifts. Jensen will take you on a journey that will change the way you view your life and your place in it. It will not be an easy journey, and parts of it will haunt you daily, but all of it is important to be aware of...these things happen, these things exist, and the Earth and her inhabitants are crying out to be heard.
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted February 13, 2001
This is one of those books that change your life, and your vision of the world is never the same as before reading it. Jensen manages to look at an amazing array of topics, from our consumer culture to dysfunctional family dynamics and see them all as the result of lack of truth in our vision, in the stories we tell ourselves. If you care about the earth, the trees and the creatures, this book is a must read. It caused me to feel a connection to the natural world that, I for one, never felt before reading it, and to take action to do what I can to preserve what I can. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. It's tough reading becase of the radical honesty he lives, but this is a book I wish I had enough money to buy for everyone I know and love.
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted March 11, 2001
There are no easy answers to the social and environmental problems of our generation. Instead of facing the sick culture we have created and the effect it is having on the natural world, we too often fall silent and choose to deny that we are all involved - directly or indirectly - in the destruction. Our society has made it easy for us to tune it out. But this silence is what is killing our planet. Read this book, think about what its message implies for all of us, and most of all - talk about it!
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted May 7, 2011
If this book doesn't change your views on the ecology, re-read it. Derrick Jensen strips away the rhetoric and places the focus exactly where it belongs - changes are not only needed, they're required if we intend to leave our children an inhabitable planet.
Don't just read this, pass it around
Kiana38
Posted January 19, 2010
This is one of the best books I have ever read. I absolutely love it!! I would recommend this book to anyone. The thigns it talks about are so true and it makes you sit there and really think about your life and how you are living it.
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Posted January 25, 2007
When I started reading this book i thought i would be just about the author and what he wnet threw when he was a kid. But when i got into the book i realized that i just wasn't about him. Derrick had done some research and found information about other stories. Some of these stories were interesting but others won't. At first i didn't get why he would put this in his book, but then i realized that they all had meanings to them. Some of these stories were kind of gross like the one about the dogs. They made me sad and made. I guess all these stories kind of showed that people do bad things even though they don't think they are bad. When you were reading about what Derricks father had done to him, it painted such a clear picutre, and it was like you could almost see what was going on when you were reading. Overall this was a good book. It really makes you think how good of life you have, and for some how crappy theres are.
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Overview
At once a beautifully poetic memoir and an exploration of the various ways we live in the world, A Language Older Than Words explains violence as a pathology that touches every aspect of our lives and indeed affects all aspects of life on Earth. This chronicle of a young man's drive to transcend domestic abuse offers a challenging look at our worldwide sense of community and how we can make things better.