The essays in this collection came about during the unhurried months when one who had traveled incessantly was obliged to stay still, even as events flared on all sides in a world that never stops moving. Wade Davis brings his unique cultural perspective to such varied topics as the demonization of coca, the sacred plant of the Inca; the Great War and the birth of modernity; the British conquest of Everest; the endless conflict in the Middle East; reaching beyond climate fear and trepidation; on the meaning of the sacred. The anthropological lens, as Davis demonstrates, reveals what lies beneath the surface of things, allowing us to see, and to seek, the wisdom of the middle way, a perspective of promise and hope that all of the essays in this collection aspire to convey.

Introduction --This is America -- Why anthropology matters -- The promised land -- The unraveling of America -- Of war and remembrance -- The crowning of Everest -- The art of exploring -- Mother India -- A new word for indigenous -- The divine leaf of immortality -- Beyond climate fear and trepidation -- A message to a daughter -- On the sacred.