Subject: Barry Lopez Reading
Date: Dec 21 08:28:41 2000
From: jim_rosso at mediaseek.com - jim_rosso at mediaseek.com


Last night I had the opportunity of listening to a reading by Barry Lopez
at Elliott Bay Books. He read two stories from his collection of fiction
stories, "light action in the caribbean". Both stories included birds. In
the story The Mappist, some of which takes place in North Dakota, the
Swainson's Hawk and its prey species the Richardson Ground Squirrel are
mentioned. "When he placed the next map in front of me, the summer
distribution of Swainson's hawks, and the slid in next to it a map showing
the overlapping summer distribution of its main prey species, the
Richardson ground squirrel, the precision and revelation were too much for
me."
Through my job I spend time evaluating educational material. Quite often
when they mention birds they get the details wrong. Sometimes they get most
of it wrong. To me it has always been a sign of disrespect. They didn't
care enough to get it right. It wasn't important enough for them. Listening
to Barry Lopez last night I could feel his respect for what he wrote about.


Jim Rosso
jrosso at mediaseek.com
bichalk.com
Bellevue, Washington