The Outermost House by Henry Beston

The Outermost House by Henry Beston

The seventy-fifth anniversary edition of the classic book about Cape Cod, "written with simplicity, sympathy, and beauty" (New York Herald Tribune)

A chronicle of a solitary year spent on a Cape Cod beach, The Outermost House has long been recognized as a classic of American nature writing. Henry Beston had originally planned to spend just two weeks in his seaside home, but was so possessed by the mysterious beauty of his surroundings that he found he "could not go."

Instead, he sat down to try and capture in words the wonders of the magical landscape he found himself in thrall to: the migrations of seabirds, the rhythms of the tide, the windblown dunes, and the scatter of stars in the changing summer sky. Beston argued that, "The world today is sick to its thin blood for the lack of elemental things, for fire before the hands, for water, for air, for the dear earth itself underfoot." Seventy-five years after they were first published, Beston's words are more true than ever.

Henry Beston (1888 – 1968) was an American writer and naturalist who is best known for his 1928 novel The Outermost House. Beston began teaching at the Université of Lyon in 1912. In 1914, he returned to Harvard as an assistant in the English department. In 1915, Beston enlisted in the French army as an ambulance driver. In his debut book, A Volunteer Poilu, he chronicled his service in the Bois le Pretre and at the Battle of Verdun.

In 1918, Beston was appointed as a press representative for the United States. The only American correspondent to travel with the British Grand Fleet and to be onboard an American destroyer during a combat engagement and sinking were highlights of this period. Full Speed Ahead, his second book of journalistic work, recounted these events. Henry Beston Sheahan began writing fairy tales under the name Henry Beston after World War I ended.

The Firelight Fairy Book was released in 1919, while The Starlight Wonder Book was published in 1923. He worked as an editor for The Living Age, an extension of The Atlantic Monthly, during this time. While there, he met his future wife, Elizabeth Coatsworth, a children's book author.