Between the Lines


By Larry Burke, Publisher/Editor-in-chief

Over the years, we at Outside have occasionally trained our sights on places that offer just the right blend of culture, progressive-mindedness, and proximity to the great outdoors: the best towns in America. But recently we got to thinking about broader horizons, about a more cosmopolitan twist. Witness this month's cover story, "Pack Up the Grill, Honey, We're Moving to Reykjavík," designed for anyone who might be contemplating a really big move. Or who simply fantasizes about it. We take a close look at ten of the world's great cities, from Istanbul to Cape Town to Melbourne, carefully considering how an American might go about living in these communities without falling into the usual insularism of expat existence. The package incorporates the efforts of two dozen people, including an international cast of stringers who — damn them — are lucky enough to live in our chosen outposts. Plus, a few old travel hands — including Joshua Hammer, Guy Martin, and Marshall Sella — offer tips on how to hurdle cultural, language, and other barriers. So get your shots and visas lined up. We won't leave a light on for you.

While you're indulging your wanderlust, don't get too envious; the wages of sin, after all, is death. For more on the subject of sin, turn to "We Confess," where an all-star crew of writers considers the seven deadly sins as they apply to the moral universe of the outdoors. E. Annie Proulx, National Book Award-winning author of The Shipping News and more recently Accordion Crimes, opens the package by taking on gluttony. Ian Frazier, whose Coyote v. Acme appears in paperback this month, sizes up pride. Editor-at-large Tim Cahill takes a short, lazy stroll through sloth. Bill McKibben, in his look at covetousness, spills his compulsion for gear-related acquisitiveness. Garrison Keillor considers the ethical shadings of envy, "a subject," he notes, "we midwesterners know all too well." Gretel Ehrlich, whose book Questions of Heaven came out last month, embraces lust. And finally, Montana writer Bryan Di Salvatore tackles anger. Di Salvatore, who admits he tends to take a "black view toward most of humankind," found his rant quite therapeutic. "To paraphrase Alexander Pope," he says, "anger is sorrow to advantage dressed." Among the artists recruited to convey these base impulses are Jim Ludtke and Greg Clarke — who, as neighbors in Los Angeles, have formed a suspicious enclave with yet a third illustrator-neighbor, Gary Baseman, who provided the opening image for our great cities piece.

Chicago journalist and Outside book reviewer Miles Harvey ("Mr. Bland's Evil Plot to Control the World") spent nearly a year retracing the criminal trail of a peculiar culture vulture: a map thief named Gilbert Bland, whose larceny provides an intriguing peek into the obsessive world of ancient map collecting. "Bland was sort of a split personality," says Harvey. "On the one hand, he could melt right into the woodwork; on the other, his whole operation was unbelievably brazen. Map people still marvel at the sheer audacity of his thievery."

In "Poser," Outside correspondent Rob Buchanan attempts to make sense of the sneering rise of snowboarder-mountain biker Shaun Palmer, a hellion of the slopes with a disposition that has often seemed on loan from Sid Vicious. "Shaun's certainly driven by demons and shadowed by a dysfunctional past," says Buchanan, "but he's more than simply a hooligan. He's a truly extraordinary athlete who's working to put a lid on his dark side."

Fans of The Wild File will be pleased to see the column's return after a brief hiatus. Now sitting in the polymath's hot seat is Elizabeth Royte, who in writing for Harper's and Smithsonian as well as Outside has long been drawn to the oddities of the natural world — as evidenced by her other contribution this month, a Field Notes report on Botswana's endangered wild dogs. "One of my first stories for Outside was about maggots, and ever since then I seem to be drawn to the darker nooks of natural science," says Royte, cheerfully adding, "the creepier, the better."