Best of Nature Writing: American Classics

These are works that have stood (and will stand) the test of time. Many of these books have won major literary prizes, including the Nobel Prize for Literature, the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the John Burroughs Medal for Distinguished Nature Writing, the Orion Society John Hay Award, the Association for the Study of Literature and Environment Best Book Award, the Bollingen Prize for Poetry, and others.

Titles in this section are arranged alphabetically by author, rather than by title as in the other sections of SavingTheEarth.net. This makes it possible to see at a glance the focal interests of an author and the breadth of his or her published work.

Directory of Classic American Nature Writing

See Award Code Key for explanation of awards and honors.

Before Walden Page 1	Before Walden Page 2	Henry David Thoreau
John James Audubon	John Lawson	Cape Cod
William Bartram	Lewis and Clark	Collected Essays and Poems
A. Nunez Cabeza de Vaca	Alexander Philip Maximilian	Faith in a Seed
Mark Catesby	Thomas Morton	The Maine Woods
H. St. John De Crevecoeur	Thomas Nuttall	Walden
Susan Fenimore Cooper	John Kirk Townsend	Week on the Concord River
William Dunbar	Gilbert White	Wild Fruits
Ralph Waldo Emerson	William Wood	Thoreau's Journal: 1851
John Charles Fremont	Anthologies	Thoreau Biographies
Thomas Jefferson		Thoreau Criticism

19th Century	Since 1900 Page 1	Since 1900 Page 2
Isabella L. Bird	Edward Abbey 100	William Beebe 100
William H. Brewer	David Abram	Thomas Berry
John Burroughs	Diane Ackerman NBC	Wendell Berry JH
Charles Darwin	John Alcock JB	Henry Beston
George P. Marsh	Durward L. Allen	John Blaustein
John Muir	Walter Inglis Anderson	Marcia Bonta
John Welsey Powell	Homero Aridjis JB	Charles Bowden
Theodore Roosevelt	Mary Austin	Bruce Brown
Joshua Slocum	J. A. Baker	Steven L. Buchmann
	Rick Bass	Alan Burdick NBA
	Keith H. Basso	David G. Campbell JB
	Roy Bedichek	Christopher Camuto
		Archie Fairly Carr JB, 100

Since 1900 Page 3	Since 1900 Page 4	Since 1900 Page 5
Sally Carrighar	Lois Crisler	Colin Fletcher
David M. Carroll JB	Jan DeBlieu JB	David R. Foster
Rachel Carson NBA, JB, 100	William deBuys PP	James Galvin
Douglas H. Chadwick	Vincent G. Dethier JB	Jane Goodall
Craig Childs	Annie Dillard NBC, PP	S. J. Gould NBA, NBC, PP
Michael P. Cohen	J. Frank Dobie	Wallace Byron Grange JB
Christopher Cokinos	M. Stoneman Douglas 100	John Graves NBA
Frank C. Craighead, Jr. 100	David James Duncan NBA	Bill Green JB
	Gretel Ehrlich	Jay Griffiths OBA
	Loren Eiseley NBA	John A. Haines
	Michael Engelhard	Gunnar Hansen
	Robert Finch	John Hay JH, JB

Since 1900 Page 6	Since 1900 Page 7	Since 1900 Page 8
Bernd Heinrich NBA, JB	Joseph Wood Krutch NBA	Peter Mattheissen JB, NBA, NBC
Edward Hoagland NBA, NBC	Dolores Lachapelle	Gavin Maxwell
Helen Hoover	Ken Lamberton JB	Bill McKibben
Tom Horton JB	Ronald M. Lanner	Thomas McNamee
Sue Hubbell	Gretchen Legler ASLE	John McPhee PP, NBC, JB, NBA
Cynthia Huntington	Aldo Leopold 100
Florence Page Jaques JB	David Leveson NBA
Josephine Winslow Johnson	Ted Levin JB
Kenn Kaufman	Ann Linnea
Rockwell Kent	William Longgood
Laurence Kilham JB	Barry Lopez JH, NBA, NBC, JB
Robin Wall Kimmerer JB	John Madson
Gilbert C. Klingel JB	Robert Marshall
Donald Kroodsma JB	Anne Matthews PP

Since 1900 Page 9	Since 1900 Page 10	Since 1900 Page 11
Ellen Meloy PP, JB, NBC	Roderick Nash	Robert Michael Pyle JB
W. S. Merwin JH, NBA	Richard Nelson JB	David Quammen JB
Enos A. Mills	Adam Nicolson	Jonathan Raban NBC
John Hanson Mitchell	Jim Nollman	Janisse Ray ABA
Bernard Moitessier	Kenneth S. Norris	Chet Raymo LLA
N. Scott Momaday PP	Dan O'Brien	Marc Reisner NBC
Bradley John Monsma	Charlton Ogburn, Jr. JB	David Roberts
Adolph Murie JB	Mary Oliver PP, NBA	John J. Rowlands
Margaret Murie 100	Sigurd Olson JB, 100	Jack Rudloe
Gary Paul Nabhan JB	Mark & Cordelia Owens JB	Everett Ruess
	Craig Packer JB	Carl Safina JB, LLA, 100
	Doug Peacock	George Schaller NBC, NBA, 100
	Donald Peattie
	Michael Pollan BS, NBC

Since 1900 Page 12	Since 1900 Page 13	Since 1900 Page 14
A. W. Schorger	Stephen Trimble	Ann Zwinger JH, JB
Carolyn Servid	Jack Turner
Paul Shephard	Linda Underhill
Leslie Marmon Silko	John C. Van Dyke
George L. Small NBA	David Rains Wallace JB
Gary Snyder NBC, B, NBA, PP	William W. Warner PP
Kim R. Stafford	Scott Weidensaul PP
T. Stanwell-Fletcher JB	Jonathan Weiner PP, NBC
Wallace Stegner NBA, 100	Alan Weisman NBC
John Steinbeck NP	Lew Welch
Peter Steinhart	T. H. White
John Tallmadge	Terry Tempest Williams
John and Mildred Teal	E. O. Wilson PP, NBC, 100
Lewis Thomas NBA, PP
Stephen D. Thomas
Patrick Tierney NBA
Tim Traver
James Trefil

Award Code Key

100 Listed in "100 Champions of Conservation in the 20th Century by the Audubon Society	LLA Lannon Literary Award for Nonfiction
ABA American Book Award	NP Nobel Price for Literature
ASLE ASLE Best Book of Environmental and Creative Writing	NBA National Book Award Winner or Finalist
B Bollingen Prize for Poetry	NBC National Book Critics Circle Award Winner or Finalist
BS Book Sense Book of the Year	OBA Orion Book Award
JB John Burroughs Medal for Distinguished Nature Writing	PP Pulitzer Prize Winner or Finalist
JH Orion Society John Hay Award

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