The first edition of this book, published in 1994, reshaped the direction of landscape studies by considering landscape not simply as an object to be seen or a text to be read, but as an instrument of cultural force, a central tool in the creation of national and social identities. This second edition adds not only a new preface, but five new essays-from Edward Said, W. J. T. Mitchell, Jonathan Bordo, Michael Taussig, and Robert Pogue Harrison-extending the scope of the book in remarkable ways.
W. J. T. Mitchellis the Gaylord Donnelley Distinguished Service Professor of English and Art History at the University of Chicago and editor of "Critical Inquiry".