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The Greenpeace to Amchitka
 
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The Greenpeace to Amchitka [Paperback]

Robert Hunter (Author), Robert Keziere (Photographer)
4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
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It had to be one of the most hare-brained ideas for a protest anyone has conceived. Eleven landlubbing environmentalists and one grizzled old sea captain would pilot a small, aging fishing boat across 3,800 kilometres of mountainous waves in the Gulf of Alaska in the middle of storm season to try to stop a hydrogen bomb test--and possibly be incinerated in the process. The epic 1971 odyssey, launched from Vancouver, failed to stop the bomb but did ignite a world-wide environmental movement, with Greenpeace at its heart. Thirty years later, the group has chapters in 40 countries and 2.8 million supporters. Journalist Robert Hunter, one of the crew members and the first president of Greenpeace, wrote a memoir of the amazing voyage soon after returning, but only now has he finally published that account, in his book The Greenpeace to Amchitka.

Hunter wrote his account in a mad, three-week binge in Vancouver while battling an ulcer. "I doubted my own sanity and was completely befuddled by the experience of 43 days on a boat with 11 other crazies," he writes in the introduction. He describes the writing experience as "the most sustained, agonizing, ecstatic creative act of my life." The frenzied yet beautifully written manuscript was rejected by his publisher in favour of a tamer, coffee-table-style photo book. Thirty years later, a friend of Hunter's discovered the only remaining photocopy of the text and encouraged him to publish it. Hunter says the result is "like some contemporary Dead Sea scroll"--"a long-forgotten tale from the dawn-time of the New Age." The Greenpeace to Amchitka wonderfully captures the idealism, mysticism, and hope of the psychedelic '60s, while also telling a lively tale of the sea about the misadventures of the wacky characters on board and their heated debates, which are no less poignant or relevant today. --Alex Roslin

Review

Hunter's Homeric ode to confused and argumentative hippies on the high seas makes fresh and crazy reading. His style is positively feverish.
—The Globe & Mail (The Globe & Mail )

The Greenpeace to Amchitkabrings alive the (mis)adventures and turmoil of an eccentric crew trying to make a difference.
—David Suzuki Foundation (David Suzuki Fnd. )

...Robert Hunter's The Greenpeace to Amchitka offers the gonzo goods. The story is essentially a Kerouac and Kesey-inspired riff on a '60's road trip, as interested in the antics of the Merry Pranksterish protagonists themselves as in the larger issues at hand. ...the innocent bravery that it depicts is still inspiring.
—Quill & Quire (Quill & Quire )

The reader quickly develops a huge respect for the quality of Hunter's reportage, and for the raw guts of the folks who first set Greenpeace afloat...
—Vancouver Sun (Vancouver Sun )
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars An Environmental Butterfly Effect, Mar 7 2008
By 
Steven Teasdale (Markham, ON) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: The Greenpeace to Amchitka (Paperback)
According to the butterfly effect, the flapping of a butterfly's wings in China can ultimately result in a tornado in North America. That is, small variations in initial conditions of a given system can have large and unpredictible effects. The Greenpeace to Amchitka: An Environmental Odyssey demonstrates how a small act by a determined group of individuals begat the worldwide environmental organisation known as Greenpeace.

In 1972, a group of intrepid peaceniks from western Canada, along with a contemplative engineer and a gruff captain, set sail on a dilapidated forty-year old fishing vessel from Vancouver to Amchitka (a small island in the Aleutians), hoping to force the cancellation of nuclear device test by the U.S. government. The Greenpeace To Amitchka is a first-person account by this journey by the late Bob Hunter.

Hunter was well known to Torontonians as an environmentalist, newspaper columnist, and television reporter. It is not quite as well known that Hunter was a founding member of Greenpeace and was on the ill-fated voyage of the Phyllis McCormack that fall of 1972. That persevering vessel would be renamed en route as the Greenpeace as it continued the desperate and ultimately futile voyage.

The book is written in a late 1960s "gonzo journalism" style reminiscent of writers such as Hunter S. Thompson. As such, the prose comes across as somewhat dated, yet retains a lively and frenetic feel. The tensions between the picaresque participants are captured with unabashed honesty, and Hunter writes with a mixture of humour and pathos. Like Darwin's Voyage of the Beagle, the book provides a vivid description of a remote part of the world that few of us have or ever will see. The book also contains many photographs by Robert Keziere, who perfectly captures the bleak landscapes and stoic countenances of the participants.

The voyage was unsuccessful in its initial goal of stopping the nuclear test. Bad weather, frequent delays, harassment by the U.S. Navy, and a rift among the protesters all contributed to the cancellation of the voyage. However, the dejected protesters returned to Vancouver as environmental celebrities, due to the growth of public awareness resulting from media coverage of the voyage. Like the butterfly's wings, this initial futile and seemingly inconsequential event sowed the seed for a trans-national environmental movement... a movement that became Greenpeace.
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Amazon.com: 4.7 out of 5 stars (3 customer reviews)

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Bob Hunter created Greenpeace - read about it here!, Jun 16 2005
By Cactus Ed - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Greenpeace to Amchitka (Paperback)
Robert Hunter died May 2nd, 2005, shortly after this book was published. I have every book he ever published; every damn one of them is a trip to read, like you're sitting in a bar with this great storyteller and he cannot stop talking - and you don't want him to! Bob was a great storyteller, and this one about the first-ever Greenpeace voyage (indeed, before there even was a Greenpeace!) is as good as anything he ever wrote. Bob was as alive as any man who walked the earth. An incredibly insightful writer who knew how important "getting the story out" was to the cause. It has been said that without Bob Hunter there never would have been a Greenpeace. I agree totally. He wrote with an intensity and with great humor, but never as an outsider. He was totally engulfed in the great causes of early Greenpeace: the whales and seals, the nuclear testing. And the last book he wrote (2030, written in 2002) was all about global warming, also a great read. Bob will be missed! I was lucky to have met and worked with Bob back in the early Greenpeace days. We shared a sixpack of beer and talked about big-picture ecology, life, love - everything we really care about. That was Bob Hunter. With his passing I rededicate my life to what Bob was all about. A great guy, a great writer. I recommend all his books - most of which you'll have to find used by now. I treasure his books on my shelf much like I treasure my collection of Edward Abbey books. Those two guys go great together. Peace Bob! Godspeed!

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars An environmental butterfly effect, Nov 10 2008
By Steven Teasdale - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Greenpeace to Amchitka (Paperback)
According to the butterfly effect, the flapping of a butterfly's wings in China can ultimately result in a tornado in North America. That is, small variations in initial conditions of a given system can have large and unpredictible effects. The Greenpeace to Amchitka: An Environmental Odyssey demonstrates how a small act by a determined group of individuals begat the worldwide environmental organisation known as Greenpeace.

In 1972, a group of intrepid peaceniks from western Canada, along with a contemplative engineer and a gruff captain, set sail on a dilapidated forty-year old fishing vessel from Vancouver to Amchitka (a small island in the Aleutians), hoping to force the cancellation of nuclear device test by the U.S. government. The Greenpeace To Amitchka is a first-person account by this journey by the late Bob Hunter.

Hunter was well known to Torontonians as an environmentalist, newspaper columnist, and television reporter. It is not quite as well known that Hunter was a founding member of Greenpeace and was on the ill-fated voyage of the Phyllis McCormack that fall of 1972. That persevering vessel would be renamed en route as the Greenpeace as it continued the desperate and ultimately futile voyage.

The book is written in a late 1960s "gonzo journalism" style reminiscent of writers such as Hunter S. Thompson. As such, the prose comes across as somewhat dated, yet retains a lively and frenetic feel. The tensions between the picaresque participants are captured with unabashed honesty, and Hunter writes with a mixture of humour and pathos. Like Darwin's Voyage of the Beagle, the book provides a vivid description of a remote part of the world that few of us have or ever will see. The book also contains many photographs by Robert Keziere, who perfectly captures the bleak landscapes and stoic countenances of the participants.

The voyage was unsuccessful in its initial goal of stopping the nuclear test. Bad weather, frequent delays, harassment by the U.S. Navy, and a rift among the protesters all contributed to the cancellation of the voyage. However, the dejected protesters returned to Vancouver as environmental celebrities, due to the growth of public awareness resulting from media coverage of the voyage. Like the butterfly's wings, this initial futile and seemingly inconsequential event sowed the seed for a trans-national environmental movement... a movement that became Greenpeace.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars A Journey That Continues to Inspire, Aug 16 2008
By Ma Tianjie "TVhead" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Greenpeace to Amchitka (Paperback)
This is a truly allegorical story, an environmental Moby Dick that continues to define the organization (and perhaps a movement) that was born of this journey. Bob Hunter's intense (and sometimes freakishly funny) style of storytelling enables the reader to better understand the very origin of the philosophy, strategies, and values embodied in Greenpeace (and other similar organizations), a quite unique branch of the global environmental movement. The strategical use of media, the direct and confrontational tactics, the embracement of deep ecology, the mixure of tough internal tensions with a true comaraderie are some of the recurring themes of this legendary sail. Although today's environmental movement is way beyond the 60s, the book still proves to be refreshingly direct and honest in a time when the movement is increasingly becoming a "special interest" and constituency/donor-oriented.
› Go to Amazon.com to see all 3 reviews  4.7 out of 5 stars 
 
 
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