Product Description

In Hold the Enlightenment, America’s favorite and funniest adventure writer returns with his most entertaining collection of essays yet, as he travels the globe and faces down challenges that are animal, topographical—and human.

Hold the Enlightenment takes Tim Cahill to sites as far-flung as Saharan salt mines, the Congolese jungle, and Hanford, Washington, home of the largest toxic-waste dump in the Western hemisphere. With his trademark wit and insight, Cahill describes stalking the legendary Caspian tiger in the mountains bordering Iraq, slogging through a pitch-black Australian eucalyptus forest to find the nocturnal platypus, diving with great white sharks in South Africa, staving off enlightenment at a yoga retreat in Jamaica, and much, much more. In these essays, vivid and masterly storytelling combine with outrageously sly humor and jolts of real emotion to show one of the most popular journalists of our time at the absolute peak of his game.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #169879 in Books
• Published on: 2002-09-03
• Released on: 2002-09-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 320 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Organized in the "chaotic logic of a pinball in urgent play," this collection takes its reader from a yoga retreat in Jamaica to the mountains bordering Iraq as smoothly as it transitions between moments of sheer hilarity and utter poignancy. In essence, what Cahill (Pass the Butterworms) has done is display various snapshots of his own life and travels, allowing the reader to experience it as he does one episode at a time. In "The Terrible Land," Cahill travels to Hanford, Wash., on a stretch of the Columbia River that is pristine and, at the same time, the largest toxic waste dump in the Western Hemisphere. In "Evilfish," Cahill responds to an article in the New York Times in which the much-loved, friendly dolphin is revealed to be a joy-killer. With his trademark clarity and wit, Cahill manages to take the article's depiction of the animal with a permanent smile one step farther, citing studies of dolphin gang-rape and infanticide while poking fun at a society that views dolphins as Flipper. Cahill takes armchair travelers on a search for the elusive Caspian Tiger in the villages of southeastern Turkey and on a midnight trek through an Australian forest as a "Wiley Platypus Hunter." He recounts his first "Bug Scream," the reaction to a half-pound centipede dropping on his chest in the midst of the Congo Basin, and recalls the generosity of the people of his own small town in Montana. This is a collection with something for everyone; each story, in its own way, manages to raise the consciousness of the reader and reveals that the author, whether he wishes to admit it or not, is absolutely on the path to enlightenment.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Outside magazine travel columnist Cahill (Pecked to Death by Ducks) explains that "an adventure is never an adventure when it happens. [A]n adventure is simply physical and emotional discomfort recollected in tranquility." In the 30 essays that make up this collection, Cahill recounts visiting salt mines in Mali during a sand storm, quaffing snake-blood cocktails in China, and observing erupting volcanoes near Quito. The locales, which vary from far-flung places to those nearer the author's home in Livingston, MT, have infinite variety and hold the reader's interest. Cahill, whose background includes teaching travel writing, is a skilled narrator and stylist. He writes with humor and insight with occasional jabs at contemporary culture. He has a lot in common with travel enthusiast Robert Young Pelton (The Adventurist: My Life in Dangerous Places). In fact, the essay "The World's Most Dangerous Friend" describes their relationship. Highly recommended for travel collections in public libraries. Ravi Shenoy, Naperville P.L., IL
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Cahill is an essayist who travels and whose travels turn into adventures. His latest book is not a travelogue that simply strings together visits to exotic locales. Instead, Cahill details his collective adventures, running the gamut from swimming with great white sharks to searching for the mythical Caspian tiger in Kurd country, to learning yoga in Jamaica. Armchair explorers will enjoy tagging along and soaking in the particulars of this series of treks in the U.S and overseas, all written in a humorous, everyman kind of style. In "Evilfish," he pokes fun at the press' penchant for humanizing wild dolphins by interspersing headlines in his essay that wittily make this point. The essays are often accounts of conflicts in other countries into which he interweaves comments on trips he had made here in the U.S., as in "Near Massacre Ranch." In his own innate way, he combines insights with opinions and provides enlightenment in the process. Eileen Hardy
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