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Show Book shows leavings from the dam water SLICKROCK words by Edward Abbey photos by Phillip Hyde a Sierra Club book $27.95 By BILL MARLING Chronicle Staff When I woke up last Saturday morning the first thing I saw was Ed Abbey standing barefoot on the desert sand and slickrock. He was drinking a beer-typical Abbey. "How are you, Bill?" "Okay," I said, which was a remarkable re-markable lie in light of the Friday night liquor consumption. I have heard that the body is 90 percent fluids; but I must have approached ap-proached 98 percent the night before. The occassion was a press conference confer-ence announcing the publication of "Slickrock," a Sierra Club format for-mat size book about the canyons of southern Utah. The text was by Abbey, the photographs by Phillip Hyde. Over 50 newspaper people, ranging rang-ing from the "New York Times" to the "Chronicle," and another dozen or so local dignitaries and Sierra Club members, gathered on the south side of the Colorado River in Glen Canyon National Recreation area for the occassion. Somehow I don't think they expected ex-pected the rasty affair that ensued. en-sued. They were treated to a debate between Henry Helen, Utah roads director, and a Sierra Club director. direc-tor. They heard Calvin Black, San Juan County commissioner, ex- coriate anyone who did not reside in his domain. They even watched Robert Redford shake hands with Ed Abbey. Oh yes, the book. A good book. Maybe not a great good book, but certainly a good book. It contains more copy than most Sierra Club books and it is topically oriented. But the copy is that easy flowing Ed Abbey, so that by the time you come to issues he has you on his side (if you weren't already). Phil Hyde's pictures are outstanding. outstand-ing. The only reason they don't rival Eliot Porter's "Glen Canyon" work, is that all the country Porter Por-ter photographed is now under water. Of the country that escaped es-caped Lake Powell-Escalante, Capitol Reefs, Canyonlands-these are the best pictures that have been taken. |
