LOWER LAKE, Calif. – The next Sierra Club Lake Group community meeting will take place at 7 p.m. Wednesday, March 19, at the Lower Lake Methodist Church Community Room, 16255 Second St. in Lower Lake.

Sonoma State professor emeritus Jonah Raskin will take a long look at the “wilderness,” a distinctly American landscape that has shaped our national character and our national literature.

Focusing on three writers – Roger Williams, Meriwether Lewis and Mary Austin – from three different centuries, the 17th, 19th and the 20th, he will discuss the ways that Americans have viewed the wilderness and written about it in fiction, non-fiction and poetry.

Raskin's talk illustrates the multiplicity of wilderness perspectives and suggests that if it has defined us we have also defined it – and can redefine it, too.

Raskin is the author of 14 books, some about farming and food, some about writers and their work, some about families and friends.

A longtime resident of Sonoma County, he taught literature and law at Sonoma State University for thirty years. These days he writes and travels, and walks and swims.

The meeting is free and open to the public as always.

For more information contact Lake Group Chair Ed Robey at 707-994-8304 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .