Earth Keeper: Reflections on the American Land by N. Scott Momaday

A magnificent testament to the earth, from Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and poet N. Scott Momaday.

One of the most distinguished voices in American letters, N. Scott Momaday has devoted much of his life to celebrating and preserving Native American culture, especially its oral tradition. A member of the Kiowa tribe, Momaday was born in Lawton, Oklahoma and grew up on Navajo, Apache, and Peublo reservations throughout the Southwest. It is a part of the earth he knows well and loves deeply.

In Earth Keeper, he reflects on his native ground and its influence on his people. "When I think about my life and the lives of my ancestors," he writes, "I am inevitably led to the conviction that I, and they, belong to the American land. This is a declaration of belonging. And it is an offering to the earth."

In this wise and wonderous work, Momaday shares stories and memories throughout his life, stories that have been passed down through generations, stories that reveal a profound spiritual connection to the American landscape and reverence for the natural world. He offers an homage and a warning. He shows us that the earth is a sacred place of wonder and beauty, a source of strength and healing that must be honored and protected before it's too late. As he so eloquently and simply reminds us, we must all be keepers of the earth.

N. Scott Momaday (1934-2024) is an internationally renowned poet, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, artist, teacher, and storyteller. He authored numerous works that include poetry, novels, essays, plays, and children's stories. He won the Pulitzer Prize for his debut novel House Made of Dawn and was the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including the Academy of American Poets Prize, the National Medal of Arts, the Ken Burns American Heritage Prize, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize Foundation's Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award, and the Frost Medal for distinguished lifetime achievement in poetry. A longtime professor of English and American literature, Momaday earned his PhD from Stanford University and retired as Regents Professor at the University of Arizona. In 2022, he was inducted into the inducted into the Academy of American Arts and Letters.

Review Quotes:

"Poets and storytellers have always reminded us of our spiritual connections to the land and the world around us--passed along through dreams, stories, memories, and mythologies. Scott Momaday skillfully continues this tradition in Earth Keeper, from which we can all learn and benefit." - Robert Redford

"Earth Keeper is a prayer for continuity in these days of uncertainty. I cannot tell you why I loved this book, I can only tell you I wept my way through it. Each page brought me closer to myself, a self I had lost in the pandemic. We need Scott Momaday's calm, clear prose and stories. Words are medicine. There is wisdom in sharing what one knows, especially at a time when we know so little. 'Let me say my heart, ' he says. And he does." - Terry Tempest Williams, author of Erosion: Essays of Undoing

"Dazzling. . . . In glittering prose, Momaday recalls stories passed down through generations, illuminating the earth as a sacrosanct place of wonder and abundance. At once a celebration and a warning, Earth Keeper is an impassioned defense of all that our endangered planet stands to lose." - Esquire

"A timely meditation on the natural world -- as well as what we stand to lose as the climate changes." - New York Times

"Wonder abounds in these pages. . . . Short chapters of prose that read almost like prayers to the natural world." - Kirkus Reviews

"Short but satisfying. . . . Using lyrical, heartfelt language, [Momaday] looks back on a life lived close to nature, and on the joy that natural wonders have given him. . . . At a time when bad news is in plentiful supply, readers will find Momaday's words refreshing and comforting in their sincerity." - Publishers Weekly

"A profound reflection on humanity's relationship with its terrestrial home, the planet Earth." - Booklist

"A collection of short essays as multilayered and majestic as the landscape that has been present in everything that Momaday has written. . . . [A] poetic love letter to the Earth." - Minneapolis Star Tribune