The Enduring Appeal of Louis L’Amour and American Western Fiction
Tuesday, March 25 2025
Louis L’Amour is widely considered the best-selling author of Western fiction of all time. Still highly popular with readers around the globe, L’Amour has sold over 320 million books, with numerous film and TV adaptations of his work.
- Published in Features
Visions of John Wesley Powell and the Great Canyons of the Southwest
Monday, March 17 2025
John Wesley Powell, the extraordinary one-armed Civil War veteran, was the first to explore the canyons of the Colorado Plateau by river. His remarkable story still fascinates and inspires me.
- Published in Features
Shakespeare and Company, the Legendary Bookshop in the Heart of Paris — Video Dispatch
Monday, February 10 2025
In Paris, France, this week Clay stops in at Shakespeare and Company, a legendary English-language bookshop in the heart of Paris.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
The Cuban Missile Crisis, John Steinbeck, and the Nobel Prize — October 1962
Tuesday, February 04 2025
In preparation for a cultural tour of Cuba Clay will lead later this month, he came across a surprising connection between John Steinbeck, Adlai Stevenson, and the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.
- Published in Features
Why I’m Changing The Channel
Tuesday, January 28 2025
Clay details how cable news has long failed to reliably serve Americans, why he is tuning out, and what he’ll do instead.
- Published in Features
21,000 Miles Around America — Why I Did It and What I Learned
Saturday, January 18 2025
Clay sat down with editors at LTA to answer questions and discuss his recent 41 State, 21,000 mile journey around America.
- Published in Features
John Steinbeck’s Childhood Home — Video Dispatch
Tuesday, January 14 2025
Earlier last summer Clay visited Steinbeck’s childhood home in Salinas, California.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
Shakespeare, Thoreau, and Ed Abbey in the Bitterroot Mountains
Tuesday, January 14 2025
Clay reports from his annual humanities retreat near the Montana-Idaho border in the Northern Rockies.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
How to Consult Your Destiny Via Thoreau’s Walden
Tuesday, January 07 2025
During a long life of hard reading, Henry David Thoreau’s Walden is the book that helps me understand what it is to be human.
- Published in Books
Reading Walden and Wrestling With Thoreau
Tuesday, December 31 2024
As I look to the start of the new year, Thoreau’s 1854 classic, Walden, still deeply challenges and inspires me.
- Published in Features