George Black's Blog

About

Bio:: Born in Scotland, educated at Oxford, in New York since 1981 and can't imagine living anywhere else. When I'm not wearing my editorial hat for NRDC's OnEarth magazine, I write books - on anything from the Iraq, China and U.S. foreign policy to rivers and fly-fishing. My next will be a book on 19th century violence and the exploration of Yellowstone, to be published in 2010 by St. Martin’s Press. I'm the author of many OnEarth articles, including cover stories on Patagonia (Fall 2006) and global warming, environmental refugees and Islam in Bangladesh (Summer 2008). I'm married to the author and playwright Anne Nelson, and we have two bred-in-the-bone New York kids, David (19) and Julia (17).
Roots in:: Scotland – grew up in a working-class family in a small coal-mining town, which gave me an early education in the realities of industrial pollution and social inequality.
Favorite place:: Montana (for the wild openness of the mountains), Connecticut (for the intimate settlement of a classic New England landscape), Scotland (for my personal roots and the beauty of the Highlands), anywhere with a trout stream.
Why "environmentalism" matters:: It transcends all other political issues – halting climate change and environmental degradation is going to be the key to global stability and security during my kids’ lifetimes.