The Monkey Wrench Gang (1975)
by Edward Abbey with a Preface by Robert Redford and an Introduction by Eric Schlosser
Penguin Modern Classics, 421pp
When Edward Abbey died in March 1989 his final wish was that his body be buried in the desert wilderness he so loved, unmarked and lost, “I want my body to help fertilize the growth of a cactus or cliff rose or sagebrush or tree.” This is what his friends did, in opposition to federal law, a final twist Abbey undoubtedly found funny. In his most famous work – The Monkey Wrench Gang – one sees Abbey’s opposition to the bureaucracies of modern America, a deconstruction of everything that has gone wrong in his society. The Monkey Wrench Gang did not remain the thought of one man, however, going onto inspire activist groups across America, some who even today leave messages referencing Hayduke, the central figure of this novel, and monkey-wrenching as a term synonymous with sabotage gained power again because of Abbey’s novel. In fact, many see Abbey’s novel as a guidebook, a how-to guide for committing eco-terrorism.
For a novel so enshrouded in controversy, it is such a pleasure to find that it is as funny as hell, filed with such a rambunctious spirit, and one not afraid of its controversy, it’s irreverent or its own intellect. Abbey wears these tags with pride. His book opens first with a statement:
“This book, though fictional in form, is based strictly on historical fact. Everything in it is real or actually happened. And it all began just one year from today.”
This is partially true: Abbey and his friends often committed minor acts of eco-terrorism. And then we have a memorial to Ned Ludd, a biographical quote and Byron’s quote, “Down with all kings but King Ludd.” Then finally there are the three quotes:
“…but oh my desert
Yours is the only death I cannot bear.”
-Richard Shelton
“Resist much. Obey little.”
-Walt Whitman
“Now. Or never.”
-Thoreau
Immediately one is given a sense of Abbey’s intentions, and it is not difficult to see how certain individuals could become charged by this tone. Then we have a definition of the word ‘sabotage’. There can be no doubt what territory Abbey is leading us into. With one radicalised by Abbey’s erudite selection, the novel opens with a prologue, entitled The Aftermath, and one of the most cinematic openings in modern literature. We are at a bridge on the Utah-Arizona border, a grand achievement of American architecture, and crowds are gathered to watch its official opening, six months after it first started being used. Abbey’s prose floats around the officials gathered, the spectators, the more distant Native American spectators, even up to an eagle’s view, building up this sense of expectation, of drama. Then:
“Suddenly the center of the bridge rose up, as if punched from beneath, and broke in two along a jagged zigzag line. Through this absurd fissure, crooked as lightning, a sheet of red flame streamed skyward, followed at once by the sound of a great cough, a thunderous shuddering high-explosive cough that shook the monolithic sandstone of the canyon walls. The bridge parted like a flower, its separate divisions no longer joined by any physical bond. Fragments and sections began to fold, sag, sink and fall, relaxing into the abyss.”[1]
Abbey’s narrative takes us back, and introduces us to an oddball quartet – Hayduke, the Vietnam veteran with a love of booze, guns and the great outdoors, Doc Sarvis the billboard burning activist and his partner in crime Bonnie Azzburg and the polygamist Seldom Seen Smith. These unlikely figures, united by chance, form a partnership of eco-terrorism, sabotaging the strip mines, blowing up automated trains, blowing up bridges and with their sights set on the biggest prize of them all, the Glen Canyon dam. Their actions bring them to the attention of Bishop Love, a local developer and head of the San Juan County Search and Rescue Team, whose dogged pursuit of these ‘outlaws’ brings the novel to its dramatic climax in the Maze, a complex web of desert canyons in southern Utah.
Abbey – a man who for many years worked as a ranger and fire lookout at different national parks – was keenly aware of the natural world and mans role within it. This knowledge is imbued within the four central characters of his book, and it is this knowledge that allows them to succeed in their actions, and provides Abbey’s book with much of its beauty:
“From down down far down below, carried on the wind, came the applause of Boulcher Rapids. The dried stalk and empty seed husks of the yucca rattled in the breeze, on the rimrock, under the stars. Bats dipped and zigzagged, chittering, chasing insects taking evasive action flying for their lives. Off in the dark of the woods one vulgar nightbird honked. Nighthawks rose against the gaudy sunset, soared and circled and plunged suddenly for bugs, wings making a sound like the roar of a remote bull as they pulled abruptly out of headlong dives. Bullbats. Back in the forest deep in the gloom of the pines a hermit thrush called – called who? – in flutelike silver tones. The pining poet. Answered promptly by the other bird, the clown, the raven, the Kaibab crake, with a noise like a farmhand blowing his nose.”[2]
In contrast to this natural order, the men of the Search and Rescue team use whatever mechanical means they have – jeeps, planes, helicopters, guns. The helicopter searching for them – a motif bought over from Abbey’s first successful novel, The Brave Cowboy (1956) (later turned into a film called Lonely are the Brave (1962) with Kirk Douglas) – is a failure, for unlike the animals that fly, or the creatures on the ground, it cannot enter the gullies, find hiding places under rocky clines. If only the men in pursuit obeyed the natural law of the world, Abbey is suggesting, then their task may have been easier.
Abbey’s novel has a very difficult relationship with the law and the concept of what is right. His protagonists advocate anarchy, and the figures in authority are presented as corrupt, inefficient or greedy. His protagonists see little wrong with derailing a train or blowing up a bridge and are almost entirely successful in their plans. Near the very end of the novel Seldom Seen, Bonnie and Doc Sarvis are playing a game of poker on their houseboat, a game in which their probation officer is involved. He seems to be a man bought round to the same beliefs as the gang – even Bishop Love seems finally to come round – and it is here that Abbey falls down. His resolutions seem to be saying: if the lawmen just sat down and listened to the cause, understood its motives, then they too would agree. Though the probation officer is kept away from Hayduke’s return, and knows nothing of the new plan to sabotage industry, his very presence inside this groups centre indicate a deeper complicity.
Despite this last scene flaw, Abbey’s novel is a strong one, bubbling with ideas. As Robert Redford says in his preface to the Penguin Modern Classics edition, Abbey’s “words seemed to come in tight bundles, like a Hemingway sentence.” His thoughts come in tight bundles too, like sucker punches.
Abbey followed this book with a sequel in 1989, entitled Hayduke Lives! In this book it is Abbey that lives, a man of ideas, of concern for his world, the natural order of things. It is the novel that best espouses his philosophy: “… hate injustice, defy the powerful, and speak for the powerless.” In The Monkey Wrench Gang he does all three.
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