Jacob's Wound: A Search for the Spirit of Wildness

The award-winning author of River in a Dry Land explores the Nature that we – and our religions – sprang from

The Genesis story of Jacob, the patriarch of the Judeo-Christian tradition, wrestling with a spirit has been interpreted in a multitude of ways, but never more persuasively than by Trevor Herriot in Jacob’s Wound. He sees it as a struggle between Jacob and his wilder twin brother, Esau, whose birthright Jacob has swindled. The central idea of Herriot’s brilliantly written, observant, and groundbreaking book is the wound that Jacob, the farmer, the civilized man, suffered in vanquishing Esau, the hunter, the primitive man. And the central question posed is whether we, as Jacob did with Esau, can eventually reconcile with the wildness we conquered and have been estranged from for so long.

As if ambling through the author’s beloved Qu’Appelle Valley in Saskatchewan, Jacob’s Wound takes readers on an untrodden path through history, memoir, science, and theology. Along the way, Herriot tells us stories of the past and present that illuminate what we once were and what we have become. It’s a measured journey motivated by curiosity rather than by destination, and at every turn there is insight and beautiful writing.


From the Hardcover edition.