Stranger Wycott s Place (Transmontanus)

By John Schreiber

Stranger Wycott's Place describes John Schreiber's explorations of the Chilcotin on foot, horseback, and by 4-wheel drive. A land of "mountains and old trails, coyotes and bighorn sheep, aboriginal folks, homesteaders, ranches and history," the Chilcotin begins north of Lillooet and lies between the Fraser River and the mighty Coast Mountain Range in the West. Starting from the premise that we learn best about place from the place where we are, Stranger Wycott's Place is at once a history, a writer's musings, and an appreciation of the lively wild. John Schreiber evokes formative myths and contemporary realities to guide the reader through this landscape. He is simultaneously an erudite travel guide, a chronicler of the region's stories and a clear-eyed observer. In Schreiber's words the Chilcotin comes alive, a geography of carved range, grassland, bullet holes, and broken-down barns, where past and present jostle against the realities of Interior lives. Stranger Wycott's Place asks: can humans learn to coexist with the wild, and even to recognize it within ourselves? Stranger Wycott's Place is number 17 in the Transmontanus series.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1554200377
• ISBN13: 9781554200375
• Release Date: May 2008
• Publisher: New Star Books
• Length: 128 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.8" x 0.3" x 6.8"

Customer Reviews

A Little More Wild

John Schreiber ends this beautifully written meditation upon the Cariboo-Chilcotin Plateau of south central British Columbia with, "Stranger Wycott's place is more wild now than before he settled there, more wild than those last elder years of his, alone, falling back into himself. And we are a little more wild for having heard his story." Schreiber practices quiet contemplation in the act of walking through country he knew as a boy and has learned to love as an adult. As he points out, European settlers in this land have created their own myths, often merging their lives with those of the First Nations. The book explores the question, "What is the connection between myth and wildness?" Stranger Wycott was a real person who has assumed mythic proportions in the stories old-timers tell about him. Schreiber's writing is itself mythic in the sense of revealing greater truths in the mundane events of history. Wycott was stranger in this beautiful but still wild land that resists cultivation. The book is more about the land than about a single person, and Schreiber's writing gives it a shimmering transcendence. It is a beautiful read and makes a wonderful gift.