Rexroth's Camping Guide

[Bureau of Public Secrets]

Poet, painter, essayist, translator, and 
anarchist social critic, Kenneth
Rexroth was also a highly experienced 
camper and mountaineer. In 1939 he
wrote a guidebook, "CAMPING IN THE WESTERN 
MOUNTAINS",
which was never published. The complete 
text of this book is now being
reproduced for the first time at the 
online Rexroth Archive:
http://www.bopsecrets.org/rexroth/camping 
.

Despite the passage of time, a remarkable 
proportion of Rexroth's advice
remains valid and useful. Newer campers 
will find good general guidelines;
experienced ones will pick up some fine 
points while no doubt fervently
disagreeing with one or another of 
Rexroth's opinions; and even
stay-at-homes should enjoy the wry 
comments that are sprinkled throughout
the book.

* * *

"The ideal camp is a miniature anarchist 
community, straight out of
Kropotkin. Each goes about his appointed 
task quietly and efficiently, the
functions of the group are shared with 
spontaneous equality, problems are
settled by consultation rather than 
controversy, and whatever leadership
exists is based solely on experience and 
ability. . . . Each group that
hikes or rides along the trail by day 
contented and alert, and makes camp at
night 'decently and in order' is a sort of 
test tube or kindergarten of the
good life. So don't forget, when it's your 
turn to wash the dishes, the
centuries are watching you."

"In the city the geometrical lines of 
streets and buildings are only
interrupted with the stale surprises of 
advertising posters, and the faces
one encounters reveal biographies less 
eventful than most rocks. The
mountain landscape is infinitely varied 
and constantly changing. Movement is
free, easy, relaxed; the streams are full 
of fish, the trees are full of
birds, flowers grow by the trail, deer 
jump from their coverts, even the air
is intoxicating. It is the fact that we 
are on our way that is important,
where we are going is a minor detail."


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