Rating: 
Summary: Complex and Deep
Review: I originally read this during the summer of 2001, as assigned reading for a National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Teachers' Institute on the American West, and was so captivated that I poured through it in about thirty-six hours. I reread it within a few months, and now have included it as required reading in a high school course I teach, The American West.What can I say? This book works on so many levels. Ostensibly, it's a book about the tragic Mann Gulch Fire, and the smokejumpers and ranger who perished in that blow-up. However, it functions on much deeper levels. In the broadest view, it's an exploration of identity: identities of Mann Gulch's tragic heroes, identity of young people, and certainly Maclean's identities. However, there's so much more. It works as narrative prose. It's also a technical book on how wildland fire "works." Finally, it's a tragedy in the classical sense: heroes who have everything going for them give in to hubris, leading to their ultimate demise. Admittedly, the narrative occasionally is a bit redundant, and during my third reading I found myself re-evaluating some of the stylistic choices Maclean (or his editors) made--some of it seemed a little trite. However, those observations only came across after the second or third reading. I love this book. More importantly--and surprisingly--to me, the six high school boys in my American West class this semester already love it! And everyone to whom I've given this book as a gift in the past twelve months has really enjoyed it. This is a complex and deep work that touches on a variety of levels and I highly recommend it.
Rating:
Summary: I couldn't put it down!
Review: I don't do much reading, but this book kept me captivated from the moment I picked it up. Books based on true stories can be dry and uninteresting; however, MacLean combines fact, speculation, and emotion in a way that keeps the reader clamoring for more. I was inspired to read "Young Men and Fire" after hearing Richard Shindell sing James Keelaghan's song, "Cold Missouri Waters" (based on MacLean's book) on the "Cry Cry Cry" CD. After reading this book, I feel compelled to visit the 13 crosses marking the tragic ending for those men on that Mann Gulch hillside.
Rating: 
Summary: Innocence in the Face of Danger
Review: Have you ever known someone that has been involved with firefighting? Do you want to know more about the brave, young firefighters that are risking their lives on a daily basis? If firefighting is an interest of yours or if you want to ignite a spark that will increase your interest in firefighting, I recommend reading Norman Maclean's Young Men and Fire. Maclean takes the readers through a devastating story of a young group of Smokejumpers that lost their lives in the Mann Gulch fire on August 5, 1949, in Young Men and Fire.
Maclean first captures the audience and draws them into his personal relationship to the story of the Smokejumpers. He does so by telling of his experiences with working in the forest service department. Maclean immediately presents the dangers and the horrible after effects that fires have. An emphasis on the fact that everyone is susceptible to the dangers of fire helps introduce the story. Maclean shows even the impacts that forest fires have on the animal. "A deer terribly burned. It was drinking and probably had been for a long time." (12) Maclean compares the deer's suffering to the suffering that some of the few survivors from the August 5 Smokejumping crew may have endured. It seems that fire brings life down to its barest form and demands that all things living be bonded because they are all vulnerable.
Smokejumping was a topic that I had never heard of before Young Men and Fire was suggested for my book group. I was both interested and excited at the chance to learn more about the mysterious world of Smokejumping as Maclean presents it in Young Men and Fire. Maclean's rhythmic language and detailed description all help to bring the Smokejumpers' story to life. The Smokejumpers, as people, come to life and it is easy to see them as more than just firefighters. I could see some of the same characteristics in these Smokejumpers as I see in my brother, father, uncles, grandfathers, etc. Maclean emphasizes the important characteristics that the Smokejumpers must have, "They had to be young, tough, and in one way or another from the backcountry." (26) As rough and as strong as these young men were, they still were young, innocent, and naïve to the fact that they were being sent to one of the roughest landscapes in the country to fight fires.
Maclean creates the landscape in a way that demands the readers to fear the beauty of the land before them. The Mann Gulch fire occurred in a rural area of Montana; Mann Gulch is only easily accessible by boat or by helicopter. A photograph insert is included in most copies of Young Men and Fire and it is very helpful to be able to see through photographs what Maclean is talking about. Maclean references to the included photographs and uses them only to emphasize the sheer greatness of the landscape. One aspect that Maclean elaborates on is the steepness of the land saying that the land possesses a, "76 percent slope having no shade." (192) In many of the photographs, the crosses of the 13 men that died fighting the Mann Gulch fire can be seen. Maclean particularly uses the photographs to elaborate on how details, such as crosses, helped him to reveal the truth behind the Mann Gulch fire.
At one point in Maclean's narrative, he revisits Mann Gulch with an expert friend and two of the fire's survivors, Sallee and Rumsey. Maclean continues his journey of revealing the truth behind what happened on August 5, 1949 through the first hand accounts of Sallee and Rumsey. A lot of controversy surrounds the events that occurred that day, most of which surround the foreman of that day's jump crew, Wag Dodge. Dodge and his fellow Smokejumpers knew that they were in trouble from the start because of the fire's unpredictable direction changes. Because of the steep landscape, it was impossible to keep the crew within shouting distance of one another and the group began to split apart. These young Smokejumpers quickly became terrified and began to, as Rumsey says, "'I was only thinking of my own hide.'" (96) I could not help but think that these young men were supposed to act as a team and yet, in a moment when they needed each other the most, they split and went their own ways. The majority of controversy surrounds the "escape" fire that Dodge created; an "escape" fire being a secondary fire that would create ashes for the men to lay down in and let the fire "jump" over them. Many people question the fate of the crew had they followed Dodge's instructions.
Maclean, the son of a Presbyterian minister, presents religion in Young Men and Fire in a very non-confrontational way, seeming to almost hint at the importance of religion. Maclean says that you can tell if a man is Catholic or not by whether or not he has a cross around his neck. The Smokejumpers' struggles through their journeys and their way of taking relief breaks causes me to see the allusions of the Stations of the Cross. Religion continues to peek its way through Maclean's narrative and adds to the question of fate.
Maclean does a wonderful job of telling the Smokejumpers' story and what they encountered in the last few hours of their lives. Maclean describes his own writing style in Young Men and Fire, as that of a storyteller. Maclean says, "A storyteller, unlike a historian, must follow compassion wherever it leads him." (102) As I progressed through Young Men and Fire, I could tell that Maclean is telling a story that he does not want to be forgotten. The tragedy of the Smokejumpers is one that Maclean found a great deal of compassion for and that is why he pursued the story. He spent nearly 25 years writing Young Men and Fire, only in an attempt to tell the Smokejumpers' story with the most precise details and stories. Young Men and Fire is a very accurate novel and it takes into account various viewpoints from many experts and survivors of the fire.
I would recommend Young Men and Fire to anyone that is interested in a glimpse into an often-overlooked piece of history. Smokejumping is a very interesting subject because it is rather new technique used in firefighting, coming into existence only around the early 1940's. Maclean's simple, storytelling technique will sooth you through a disastrous story of death and destruction. Maclean took great care when writing Young Men and Fire because he did not want to down play what happened to these young men. The story of Mann Gulch fire on August 5, 1949 will live forever through Maclean's Young Men and Fire. I would rate Young Men and Fire an A-. Enjoy this fantastic read about the journeys that Maclean went through to tell the most accurate story of the Smokejumpers.
Rating:
Summary: Reborn in the Sky
Review: What is a 'blowup'? What is an 'escape fire'? What is a smokejumper? I had no answers to any of these questions before I began the book Young Men and Fire by Norman Maclean. This book explores the harsh reality of forest fires and the risks undertaken by the firefighters. The book focuses on the Mann Gulch fire that happened in August of 1949 in western Montana. The fire burned 13 smokejumpers to death. Smokejumpers are the 'elite' forest service firefighters who are dropped onto fires by parachute. The first half of the book intertwines firefighting and smokejumping history with facts about the Mann Gulch tragedy. The second half of the book is Maclean's search for the truth of the events leading to up to the tragedy and also his search for his own identity. Maclean uses his personal experiences, metaphors, and religion to paint a handsome, yet tragic picture of the Mann Gulch Fire.
Maclean opens the novel with a short chapter entitled 'Black Ghost.' He gives the reader an insight into his own personal reasons for writing this book. He says, "I once had seen a ghost, and the ghost again possessed me" (p4). Maclean had fought forest fires at the innocent age of fifteen. When he first heard about the young smokejumpers burning to death he immediately became obsessed with the story. He had come close to perishing while fighting a fire in his youth and could relate to the men 'dying at least three times' (p7) on that mountainside. What kept Maclean alive was the Black Ghost he had seen in his struggles with a fire, the same ghost that forces him to follow this tragedy. He writes, "fear being only partly something that makes us run away-at times, at least, it is something that makes us come back again and stare at what made us run away" (p10). Maclean's personal experiences bring the reader closer to the brutality of fire, but his use of metaphors provides the reader with a vivid feeling of the burning desire to survive.
The metaphors used in Young Men and Fire are almost as intense as the fire itself. Maclean writes, "The moment the jumper starts falling is umbilical" (p53). He relates the whole routine of 'appearing on earth from the sky' (p52) to that of being reborn. The smokejumper leaves the plane in a tuck position like that of being in the womb. A rip chord attaches the jumper to the plane like an umbilical chord to his mother. The chord makes the chute of life open after 12 feet of falling just like the umbilical chord keeps the jumper alive during pregnancy. The relation of jumping to that of being born gives the reader the sense that smokejumpers are like themselves, born of the womb. This connection allows the reader to sympathize with the innocence of these young men about to jump and fall into a tragedy. The birth metaphor is only one of many metaphors the writer uses.
Maclean turns words into pictures in other places as well. While describing the rugged landscape the smokejumpers fought during their battle, Maclean refers to "the place [Mann Gulch] in the Gates where the struggle between mountains and plains came face to face" (p44). He says the cliffs in Mann Gulch are, "the rearings and collisions and roarings of the bottoms of oceans as they stood up like sea beasts struggling to prevent anything from finding a way around them" (p45). This ironic analogy set the stage for the beastly fire that consumed the innocent children who could not find a way around the troublesome cliffs. Maclean, through his words, allows the reader to visualize the scene and gives the reader a 'seeing' perspective. He realizes, though, that a person may be blinded by smoke and cannot always see, so he also alludes to God in many instances to give the reader a spiritual perspective.
The prevalent theme of religion and God throughout the book Young Men and Fire lets the reader connect to the smokejumpers' inner struggles and beliefs. Maclean was raised and schooled by his father, a Presbyterian minister. Using his background, Maclean makes many references to God and the Bible. Early in the book, when he talks about Hellman, one of the men burned so badly that he died a day later, Maclean states, "At the end he wished he had been a better Catholic" (p29). I think Maclean overstates this point. He should not put words into Hellman's mouth. I do not know if Maclean is trying to put some humor in the passage, but playing with a person's death like that seems to go overboard. The reference to Hellman being Catholic is only one of many allusions to religion.
Maclean uses other religious references much better than the first. He writes about the landscape laden with crosses, "The Christian scene of suffering, where hill meets sky, has been painted so many thousands of times that something within it must direct it to paint itself" (p174). The setting, which he has seen personally, is almost surreal. It is like something that we might see in a sad movie, but it is real, more real than we want to believe. Maclean makes us believe with an allusion to Dante's Inferno. He writes, "Since the Inferno is also a pit, I have had to learn how to die in the Inferno always falling down" (p205). This way of dying, just like the smokejumpers died, takes away all hope and confidence. If they fall, there is nothing to save them since their only chance of survival was flight. Surviving is a tough thing to teach. Maclean cannot explain why only three people out of the 16 on the ground survived. The inexplicable nature of survival causes readers to be intrigued with those that survive. Why are they saved? Is it God? Luck? Endurance? Strength? The book causes the reader to have many questions.
Maclean's book Young Men and Fire is a must read. The book presents elements of personal experience, metaphor, and religion allowing the reader to connect with the inner thoughts of the dead. Maclean says, "True poems are hard to find" (p202). This story is a true poem and must be read by anyone looking for what saved Maclean and his identity.
Rating:
Summary: For better and worse a poetic expostion
Review: It's hard to classify this book beyond saying that it's a moving non-fiction tale. Maclean uses historical techniques to reconstruct the Mann Gulch fire of August 5, 1949, but his exposition is poetic rather than historical. For example, the author imagines his characters' thoughts and ponders the writing process as well as his wife's death from cancer. Sometimes Maclean's lyrical prose seems just and apt, at other times silly and pretentious. I suppose every reader could put together his own list of good and bad sentences. As examples of the former let me suggest two from the first paragraph of Chapter One: "In 1949 the Smokejumpers were not far from their origins as parachute jumpers turned stunt performer dropping from the wings of planes at county fairs just for the hell of it plus a few dollars, less hospital expenses.... They were still so young they hadn't learned to count the odds and to sense they might owe the universe a tragedy." (19) As examples of the latter, I offer two from near the end of the book: "...the compassion felt for themselves by the tragic young is self-pity transformed into some divine bewilderment, one of the few emotions in which the young and the universe are the only characters. Although divine bewilderment addresses its grief to the universe, it only cries out to it." (299) Generally Maclean, his subject, and his literary style seem most congruent when the humanity of the Mann Gulch tragedy is addressed, less fitting when the author discusses hard science. Perhaps recognizing this weakness, the University of Chicago Press did not create an index for this book.
Rating:
Summary: A Heated Investigation
Review: Soaring high above the earth, you are on a mission. Densely crammed into a plane, you are part of a team of adventurous souls. Sitting straddle-legged on the floor with your back to the cockpit, the group forms one body. The roasting heat of the fire below rises, and the air begins to gnaw tirelessly at your soul. In preparation of the jump, you and the others stand, approach the open door, and wait anxiously for the signal. Receiving a tap on the left leg, it is time. Crouching in the tuck position, you fall into the flaming world below.
The task of a smokejumper is intensely frightening. In Young Men and Fire, Norman Maclean shares the tragic experience of thirteen smokejumpers' fight in the Mann Gulch Fire. Searching for truth, in a land of ashy remains, Maclean thoroughly explores the untold stories of one group's disastrous struggle in the forests of Missoula, Montana. Deeply gripping, Young Men and Fire becomes one man's captivating journey through the fires of the land and his aged soul.
Young Men and Fire is a three-part, non-fiction account of one of Montana's deadliest forest fires. Haunted by the unanswered mysteries of the Mann Gulch Fire, Maclean begins to unravel the stories of these thirteen young men who so horribly perished. In sensitive and compelling language, he describes the innocence of these smokejumpers. "As the elite of young men, they felt more surely than most who are young that they were immortal. So if we are to feel with them, we must feel that we are set apart from the rest of the universe and safe from fires, all of which are expected to be put out by ten o'clock the morning after Smokejumpers are dropped on them" (298). In a tender, almost storyteller tone, Maclean molds our visions of these men by conveying their "immortal" outlook on life. The author wants his readers to feel connected to their souls and illustrates images of their lives: the women they loved, the families they parted from, and the goals they were unable to reach. As Maclean develops our understanding of the smokejumpers, both their personal characteristics and the dynamics of their job, he begins to explore why the Mann Gulch tragedy had such a personal impact on his own life.
In every aspect, Maclean's exploration through the Mann Gulch Fire was a religious experience. He describes the smokejumpers' falling as "umbilical, an act of rebirth," as they descend from sky to earth (53). With overwhelming Christian tones, Maclean shares his beliefs that smokejumping is a spiritual task; just as we are delivered from the heavens, the jumpers fall again from the skies above. Continually, the author will refer to his religious analogies of smokejumping. After studying the scientific details surrounding the deaths of the smokejumpers, Maclean shares his own evidence on the meaning of the death. "At the very end beyond thought and beyond fear and beyond even self-compassion and divine bewilderment there remains some firm intention to continue doing forever and ever what we last hoped to do on earth. By this final act they had come about as close as body and spirit can to establishing a unity to themselves with earth, wind, fire and perhaps the sky" (300). I was deeply moved to see that Maclean had such reflections on the passing of life. For here, the reader is able to see that the Mann Gulch tragedy had turned into a search for answers in the hills of Montana as well as in the heart of one elderly man.
Maclean's in depth study of the Mann Gulch Fire, gives readers a breathtakingly real understanding for the complexity and seriousness of smokejumping. I had no previous knowledge of this aspect of firefighting, and found his lessons fascinating. Maclean provides a haunting investigation into the emotions and realities that plague all smokejumpers. His writing is historic, yet simple, and allows many audiences an opportunity to learn the story of such a significant event. Maclean prompts his readers, through his comprehensive writing, to reexamine their notions of the tragedy. He suggests, "you can see tragedy coming from a considerable distance when you are older, but when you are young tragedy dies not pertain to you and certainly never catches up to you (278). Again, Maclean is exposing his views, and the reader begins to see that this book became an exploration of his own mortality.
For fourteen years, Norman Maclean searched for truth. He did not find every answer to the mysteries surrounding the Mann Gulch Fire; however, he discovered something greater. Maclean gave voices to those who could not speak, shared stories that were buried far too long, and found meaning through tragedy. Norman Maclean passed away before his book was published, but the press uncovered his work and concluded that "Young Men and Fire was where, near the end, all the lives he had lived would merge: the lives of a woodsmen, firefighter, scholar, teacher, and storyteller" (xiii). This book is truly an accomplished work of nature, humanity and faith.
Rating:
Summary: A Fire To Spark Your Interest
Review: Norman Maclean wrote Young Men and Fire to tell the story of the Mann Gulch fire of 1949, a tragedy overlooked throughout history. Maclean reconstructs the worst disaster in the history of smokejumping through the stories of the three lone survivors, old interviews, and his own personal accounts. The combination of Maclean's vivid language and personal experiences makes this a book to remember.
The story begins with an anecdote serving as a type of prelude entitled
"Black Ghost." Maclean tells of his own experiences fighting forest fires and the haunting images that stayed with him throughout his life. It is the perfect introduction to the story by giving readers a taste of what they are in for. "As a fire up a hillside closes in, everything becomes a mode of exhaustion- fear, thirst, terror, a twitch in the flesh that still has a preference to live, all become simply exhaustion" (7). It is this type of writing that makes readers feel as though they too are on a mission to outrun the growing fire surrounding them.
Maclean became involved with the story through the intrigue and mystery surrounding that fateful day. Maclean had arrived to his cabin in the Montana wilderness in the beginning on August 1949 and heard of the tragedy through small town gossip. He knew that this was something he would have to see for himself. Although Maclean knew that it was an immense disaster, he explains that the magnitude was unfathomable to even those familiar with forest fires.
Maclean surrounded himself with the story of Mann Gulch in the true fashion of a storyteller. He explains the differences between storytellers and historians by saying, "A storyteller, unlike a historian, must follow compassion wherever it leads him. He must be able to accompany his characters, even into smoke and fire, and bear witness to what they thought and felt even when they themselves no longer knew" (102). The fact that Maclean devoted himself to this tragedy makes the book feel even more important.
Although this is a tragic story, Maclean fills the pages with symbolism of growth and rebirth. Maclean compares the act of smoke jumping to birth. "The moment the jumper starts falling is umbilical...so it is to be born in the sky- with a loud noise and your feet where your head ought to be. So it is to be born in the sky with a loud noise- the moment you cease to be umbilical you become seed, blown by the wind. Although you are seed, the sky still seems like the womb..." (54). Passages like these capture a reader's attention and give a new sense of understanding to the act of smoke jumping.
While visiting the Mann Gulch with a friend, Maclean notices the beauty that has grown through the devastation. He captures this splendor with this description, "As we climbed up from the river, we soon left summer behind and were walking through the world of spring flowers, beautiful blues and yellows, lupines and vetches, and balsam roots looking with wide brown eyes at ghosts and intruders" (180). He mixes in depictions like these throughout facts and figures of the history and keeps readers interested.
Through research and old documents, Maclean could have written a book based on other's findings and quotes from interviews done with the survivors. Instead, Maclean contacted the survivors and got to know them personally. He went back to Mann Gulch numerous times, including once with the survivors, so he could accurately describe a time and place so distant and unknown to many. He talked with several fire scientists and even mathematicians to extract every possible detail to help understand every aspect of the smokejumper's decisions.
What readers come away with after reading this book is a great deal of respect for Maclean and his crew's work and such knowledge of Mann Gulch that they may feel they would be able to retell the story themselves. This is definitely not a book I would normally have chosen to read on my own, but I have learned so much from Maclean's account and gained such an appreciation for smokejumpers and firefighters that I am glad I gave it a chance.
I would recommend this book for a wide variety of audiences. It is part of the non-fiction genre, so I would begin by saying that anyone even remotely interested in this subject should check it out. My interests generally do not lie in non-fiction, so I would also suggest that anyone looking to expand their horizons and read something different may want to start with Young Men and Fire. I would say that some parts get heavy on small details, especially toward the end when Maclean goes in depth with a mathematician, but the overall experience of reading the novel is awe and a sense of appreciation.
Maclean spent 14 years recreating this long untold story. At his death in
1990, the story was still unfinished. Publishers took the matter into their own hands, editing pieces here and there but allowing Maclean's original work to remain as he intended it. It seems that Maclean could have had all the time in the world, but because he became so involved with the story, it would never have been complete in his eyes. As he stated, "This story of the Mann Gulch fire will not end until it feels able to walk the final distance to the crosses with those who for the time being are blotted out by smoke. They were young and did not leave much behind them and need someone to remember them" (102). Maclean's story allows us to remember.
Rating: 
Summary: Young Men and Fire(reviewed by M. Wolf
Review: Young Men and Fire is a book about smokejumpers. It is set in Montana, in 1949. At this time, smokejumpers were a new thing to the forest service, and most of these guys didn't have much training or any experience. In the book, fifteen smokejumpers are sent in to the Mann Gulch fire, to assist a ground crew. When they got there they had no maps or anything to guide them because they thought the ground crew would have them, but they never found the ground crew. Then the winds picked up and the fire chased the men away from it. It was moving so fast that only three of the men survived the run, and one died the next day from the burns.
I think that this is a good book and probably would recommend it. It does have a weakness in its description, which is probably because the author was not there to experience the event. I think people from Montana would like this book, but people who come from places with no rugged mountain areas would not understand it like we do.
Rating:
Summary: Good but not what I was expecting.....
Review: Having heard of the 'Man Gulch' fire through the book 'Fire on the Moutain' I was anxious to read/listen to this. While the book is good was not what I was expecting compared to "Fire on the Moutain". Both author's have their unique styles and I personally care more for the son's. But I do recommend this book, don't get me wrong.
Rating:
Summary: Young Men & Fire
Review: This is my favorite book! What a story.
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