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Praise for A Wilder Time

“While conveying the geological hypotheses, techniques of data collection, and adventures of his expeditions to Greenland with his two Danish colleagues, William E. Glassley also brings startling sensory precision to his descriptions. The velvety feeling of moss, the taste of lichen, the alternating rhythms of terror and fluidity in schools of fish through which a predatory sculpin cruises—such experiences bring what might have seemed a stark world of rock and ice alive. This delicacy of perception is the vehicle through which not only the scientific quest but also the profound mystery of our living Earth saturates this memorable book.”

—John Elder, coeditor of The Norton Book of Nature Writing and author of Picking Up the Flute

“A Wilder Time is a wonderful mix of science and poetry. It delves into the kind of spiritual effect that wilderness has on those privileged to work in it and how it changes the way we experience and understand our surroundings and our lives. The science, including the geological controversy at the heart of the book, is lucidly explained, and readers will be absorbed by the story Glassley tells as well as his many vividly described encounters with nature. Next time someone asks me why I am a geologist, I will just hand them this book.”

—William L. Griffin, professor of geology at Macquarie University

“While conducting research probing deep time and the origin of continents, Glassley discovered a further source of fascination: the Arctic wilderness of Greenland. In A Wilder Time, he shares his encounters with unvarnished nature still free—for now—from the corruptions and constructs of human settlement. With openness, clarity, and a keen eye for detail, he weaves adventure, research, astonished awe, and thoughtful reflection into an absorbing account of his sojourns.”

—Martha Hickman Hild, author of Geology of Newfoundland: Field Guide

“As geologists, we may be rational scientists, but expeditions to remote places touch something deep in us that moves us to also be poets. Glassley has turned his experiences in Greenland into searingly beautiful descriptions of a wild landscape and the ways in which that landscape moves and changes him. Every sentence is evocative, connoting curiosity, awe, and respect in equal measure. A Wilder Time is a paean on the importance of wilderness to the human spirit and a saddening reminder of what we lose when we divorce ourselves from contact with wild places. Glassley’s voice will stay with me the way the works of Loren Eiseley, Edward Abbey, Rachel Carson, and Aldo Leopold have stayed with me over the decades.”

—Jane Selverstone, professor emerita in the Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences at the University of New Mexico