Marking the sparrow's fall

1998 · Book · Wallace Stegner

“Unless everything in a man's memory of childhood is misleading, there is a time somewhere between the ages of five and twelve that corresponds to the phase ethologists have isolated in the development of birds, when an impression lasting only a few seconds may be imprinted on the young bird for life.”

Marking the Sparrow's Fall is Wallace Stegner's biggest collection and the first since his death in 1993. His son, Page, has selected fifteen essays that have never before been published in any book and placed them alongside Wallace Stegner's most powerful pieces in the book's three nonfiction parts: Home Ground (memory), Testimony (defense of the earth), and Inheritance (history). The fourth section of the book is devoted to a magnificent little-known novella, Genesis. by Wallace Stegner