River of Shadows (2003) by Rebecca Solnit

 Book Review

River of Shadows: 

 Eadweard Muybridge and the Technological Wild West (2003)

by Rebecca Solnit

   This is going to sound crazy, but I actually had the idea to write this exact book, or something like it, then I went and looked to see if anyone had already it, and found that Rebecca Solnit had written precisely the same book I had considered writing, in 2003.  I'd never heard of it before I looked it up after having the same idea myself (20 years later lol), but it won the National Book Critics Circle prize for criticism in 2004 as well as some lesser literary awards, so it isn't in any way obscure.

   I had the idea during a recent visit to the important locations of the Modoc War in Northern California/Southern Oregon between several bands of Modoc Native Americans and the United States Army(!) between 1872 and 1873.  During that war, the US Army hired San Francisco photographer and pioneer in the field of moving pictures, Eadweard Muybridge, to document the war, and he came up and took a series of photos.  It was while looking at one of those photos in the Fort Klamath historical site that I had the idea for this exact book that Rebecca Solnit wrote (with the support of a Guggenheim grant!) over 20 years ago.

  Of course, the Modoc War is just a chapter in this much longer book about the intersection of capitalism, photography, the American West and the motion picture business, and Muybridge is involved enough to keep the whole book interesting.  In fact, I'm surprised this book hasn't been turned into a biopic or prestige TV piece- it has the action to support it- including Muybridge murdering his wife's' lover in cold blood, spectacular photography trips all over the western hemisphere and a supporting cast of characters ranging from Leland Stanford to Thomas Edison.