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A classic of American literature, a cult book on its publication in 1968, this is the poetic tale of three years as a park ranger in southeastern Utah. But much more than this, it is the quest to experience nature in its purest form - the silence, the struggle, the overwhelming beauty - in the face of the growing exploitation of the wilderness by oil, mining, and tourist interests. But, as Abbey warns us in his introduction, `Do not jump into your automobile next June and rush out to the canyon country hoping to see some of that which I have attempted to evoke in these pages....most of what I write about in this book is already gone or going under fast. This is not a travel guide but an elegy. A memorial. You're holding a tombstone in your hands. A bloody rock. Don't drop it on your foot - throw it at something big and glassy. What do you have to lose?'