Maclean classic timely in wake of fire tragedy

Last week's tragic deaths of four young firefighters in Washington's Thirtymile Fire is a terrible reminder of the power and humanity of this classic work of Northwest non-fiction. "Young Men and Fire" (University of Chicago Press, 301 pages, $12) is a remarkable, even unforgettable book, both for its subject matter and for the story behind the story.

Here was an author in his seventy-fourth year pursuing what happened in a firefighting tragedy that had haunted him for four decades -- the Mann Gulch fire in western Montana that claimed the lives of 13 of the U.S. Forest Service's elite Smokejumpers, with just two survivors, in the torrid tinderbox summer of 1949. Here was an author, who in the first flush of public attention following publication of his elegiac "A River Runs Through It," summoned up all his talents and energies in the hope of making some sense of something that most others had long forgotten and finally finding that he did not have the stamina or the wits anymore to fully complete his manuscript.

Yet his editors followed Maclean's wishes, as best they could, and published "Young Men and Fire" two years after his death in 1990 at the age of 87. And the book went on to become a national best seller, as well as winner of a National Book Critics Circle Award. It continues to sell at a very steady rate and there are now 350,000 copies in print.

"Young Men and Fire" has many impressive elements. It is a technical primer on wilderness firefighting and an insightful examination of the psyche and courage of those young people (now both men and women) drawn to this dangerous profession, as Maclean himself once was.

"It is eerie how these recent fire tragedies have echoes of Mann Gulch," says Timothy Egan of Seattle, a reporter for The New York Times who covered both the 1994 South Canyon Fire in Colorado and last week's Thirtymile Fire in the Okanagan National Forest. "These firefighters are a special breed in a selfish age. When you're around them, you realize this is not play in any way; this is war. And, reading Maclean, you can't help but be caught up in the great weight and honesty that this white-haired author brought to his story."

"Young Men and Fire" is also a confounding mystery from real life, painstakingly researched by the author in historic records and conflicting accounts of witnesses and on the mountainous terrain itself, Maclean trekking upward on his personal pilgrimage to the high country of tragedy and "exhausted beyond comprehension."

But, more than anything, "Young Men and Fire" is a thoughtful meditation on mortality, that of people "so young they hadn't learned to count the odds and to sense they might owe the universe a tragedy," and that of old people left to ponder life's losses and unfinished business.

"It was important to me, as an exercise for old age," Maclean wrote, "to enlarge my knowledge and spirit so I could accompany young men whose lives I might have lived on the way to their death."

Literary addenda

Seattle true crime maven Ann Rule is one of the participants in a six-week series of true crime programs on the CBS-TV newsmagazine, "48 Hours," which kicks off this evening. CBS reporter Susan Spencer profiles Rule and her book, "The End of the Dream," which focused on an Olympia man who became one of the country's top bank robbers.

The Rule program airs at 10 p.m. next Friday.

A marriage of two fine Northwest talents -- a prize-winning writer and a tiny fine press -- will be celebrated at 7 p.m. next Thursday at Richard Hugo House, 1634 11th Ave. Writer and teacher Rebecca Brown ("The Gifts of the Body") will discuss her latest work, "Excerpts From a Family Medical Dictionary," which is being published in a beautiful limited edition ($45 paper, $125 cloth) by Grey Spider Press of Sedro-Woolley. Their year-long collaboration will be discussed by Brown and by Grey Spider's Jules Remedios Faye and Christopher Sterne.

"It was amazing," Brown says, "to be working with two people whose interest in getting every detail of the book just right was every bit as intense as my own."

The passing this week of publishing legend Katharine Graham should bring added attention to her remarkable autobiography, "Personal History," which won the Pulitzer Prize. Publication of that book, startling in its candor, brought Graham to Seattle in February of 1997 where she was feted at a reception by friends, including Microsoft's Bill Gates.

In an interview with this reporter, Graham was a feisty, no-nonsense person with undeniable charm and charisma, someone who responded to questions with frankness, wit and even an outright guffaw. She was reflective one moment, sassy the next.

"You can't think about how you'll be remembered," Graham remarked. "You can never be sure if you'll be remembered at all ... although I sure seem to be trying to make sure that I'll be remembered by writing a book that runs 625 pages."

P-I books reporter John Marshall can be reached at 206-448-8170 or johnmarshall@seattlepi.com

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