Living at moral peace with the universe. "Arctic Dreams" by Barry Lopez. This is a fascinating work.

© 2013 Christine Clifton-Thornton

"At the heart of this narrative, then, are three themes: The influence of the arctic landscape on the human imagination. How a desire to put a landscape to use shapes our evaluation of it.  And confronted by an unknown landscape, what happens to our sense of wealth.

"What does it mean to grow rich?  Is it to have red-blooded adventures and to make a fortune, which is what brought the whalers and other entrepreneurs north?  Or is it, rather, to have a good family life and to be imbued with a far-reaching and intimate knowledge of one's homeland, which is what the Tununirmiut told the whalers at Pond's Bay wealth was?  Is it to retain a capacity for awe and astonishment in our lives, to continue to hunger after what is genuine and worthy?  Is it to live at moral peace with the universe?

"...It is possible to imagine afresh the way to a lasting security of the soul and heart, and toward an accommodation in the flow of time we call history....  That dream is the dream of great and common people alike."   [from Arctic Dreams by Barry Lopez, pp. 13-14]

"A Yup'ik hunter on St. Lawrence Island once told me that what traditional Eskimos fear most about us is the extent of our power to alter the land, the scale of that power, and the fact that we can easily effect some of these changes electronically, from a distant city.  

 

"Eskimos, who sometimes see themselves as still not quite separate from the animal world, regard us as a kind of people whose separation may have become too complete.  They call us, with a mixture of incredulity and apprehension, "the people who change nature.""  [from Arctic Dreams by Barry Lopez, p. 39]