An extended meditation on a lively slip of river wilderness abutting the Mississippi. The lower Mississippi River winds past the City of New Orleans between enormous levees and a rim of sand, mud, and trees called "the batture." On this remote and ignored piece of land thrives a humanity unique to the region--ramblers, artists, drinkers, fishers, rabbit hunters, dog walkers, sunset watchers, and refugees from Immigration, alimony, and other aspects of modern life. Author Oliver A. Houck has frequented this place for the past twentyfive years. Down on the Batture describes a life, pastoral, at times marginal, but remarkably fecund and surprising. 

Oliver A. Houck, a professor of law at Tulane University, received the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Environmental Section of the American Bar Association and has been named Louisiana's Conservationist of the Year, among other honors. He is author of a book on the Clean Water Act and another called Taking Back Eden: Eight Environmental Cases That Changed the World.

ISBN: 9781604734614

Hardcover

205 pages

6 x 9

University Press of Mississippi, 2010