What are men to rocks and mountains?
Seven of my novels take place in the Southwest, in the Four Corners area which has been my home since 1973. I know these mountains, rivers, mesas and canyons well, so it's been natural for me to draw on my own personal experiences here.
Seek on high bare trails Sky-reflecting violets... Mountain-top jewels
The mountains themselves call us into greater stories.
Nature as a poet, an enthusiastic workingman, becomes more and more visible the farther and higher we go; for the mountains are fountains – beginning places, however related to sources beyond mortal ken.
I'm just moving clouds today, tomorrow I'll try mountains.
Anyone who has chanced like me to roam through desolate mountains and studied at length their fantastic shapes and drunk the invigorating air of their valleys can understand why I wish to describe and depict these magic scenes for others.
A Texas upbringing - and living now in Brooklyn, too - have surely helped my appreciation for open spaces and skies, but beyond that, it's not easy to find words for what it feels like to be up in the Rockies or out on the Great Basin - such silences and spaces! - or to be heading up into the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
The climbs up the Hand of Fatima, which is 2,000 feet, and Naga Parbat, which is just over 15,000 feet, were spectacular. The Hand of Fatima and the Kaga Tondo, in Mali, is a personal favourite of mine.
A man who keeps company with glaciers comes to feel tolerably insignificiant by and by. The Alps and the glaciers together are able to take every bit of conceit out of a man and reduce his self-importance to zero if he will only remain within the influence of their sublime presence long enough to give it a fair and reasonable chance to do its work.
Fertile plains, every foot of them tilled, are of the first necessity; but great natural playgrounds of mountain, forest, cliff-walled lake, and brawling brook are also necessary to the full and many-sided development of a fine race.
I love this place; I love mountains and big skies and forests. And the weather is still supremely beautiful even though the lower peaks are powdered with fresh snow. But Heavens! What sun. It never has an ending. I am basking at this minute - half past four - too hot without a hat, & the sky is that transparent blue only to be seen in autumn - the forest trees steeped in light.
Thou who wouldst see the lovely and the wild Mingled in harmony on Nature's face, Ascend our rocky mountains. Let thy foot Fail not with weariness, for on their tops The beauty and the majesty of earth, Spread wide beneath, shall make thee to forget The steep and toilsome way.
I have a great liking for the Chamba folk music, which depicts the beauty of women and the mountains with a touch of Indian classical music.
Watch nature, because it is your greatest teacher. It moves and flows and moves on again. There is an incredible beauty out there in the mountains, in the forests, to teach you it's silence, it's beauty, it's humility. Stay aligned to that.
The influence of fine scenery, the presence of mountains, appeases our irritations and elevates our friendships.
Of all the fire mountains which like beacons, once blazed along the Pacific Coast, Mount Rainier is the noblest.
Through woods and mountain passes The winds, like anthems, roll.
Moses Kaldor had always loved mountains; they made him feel nearer to the God whose nonexistence he still sometimes resented.
