Last American Man

I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of this book. It was written so casually as though I were listening, mesmerized, to a story teller in person. I'm not sure whether I love or pity Eustace. It must be hard to be so driven and yet to desire the simple life in nature. Read it.

Eustace has found that living a simple life in Nature brings you in touch with your own Godhood, It's connection with all of life and the gifts that come from that. He further has established a way to allow others to do this by direct experience at his Turtle Island preserve. Surely all who go to Turtle Island, even for a day, will be changed and bring this newly gained understanding back to their existence wherever they are. Offering this is Eustace's life work in hopes that it will alter the projected course of consumption, pollution and destruction that America is currently on to one of truly sustainable living which will allow the needed healing of this beloved planet Earth. The magnitude of what he has already accomplished with his life is humbling. Eustace is a visionary with a clear vision from which he does not waiver.

The topic is fascinating but it's Gilbert's writing style that keeps me coming back. She writes sentences so beautifully constructed that they stop me in my tracks, and I have to say them out loud to myself.

I had no idea that Elizabeth Gilbert had another book before Eat, Pray, Love -- and it's really great! After just a few pages, you can really see how Eat, Pray, Love took shape, I think, because this is also a book about someone who found himself, marched to the beat of a different drummer, and broke out of just about every mold out there.

As an avid reader of all kinds of outdoor literature, with an emphasis on adventure literature, I really appreciated and enjoyed this book. It's a detailed account of a guy who did things differently and always was one with and comfortable in the natural world. He's politically engaged, too, which is interesting -- so not a total recluse.

For me, this book is deeply personal and also somewhat spiritual, as it's an exploration of finding meaning in this world that can be so meaningless for so many of us. Gilbert really gets into his life, and it's an engaging read.

This book was interesting to see how others perceive how we waste things here on the earth. To understand the dedicated some men can have about preserving the environment. Was well written and held ones attention while reading.

From reading this book I found that Eustace Conway is a talented outdoorsman, conservationist, horseman, attention seeker and huge narcissist.

It's pretty clear from the start that Elizabeth Gilbert is completely in love with her subject which causes her ramble on frequently about Conway. It's not surprising that she never makes the connection that Eustace is very much like his father treating everyone the way his father treated him minus the verbal abuse. I can only imagine how lonely it must be to have everyone around constantly not living up to your expectations.

The book is full of great stories about the adventures of Eustace and all the people he treated poorly along the way.

I don't think that Conway wanted to save the planet as much as he wanted to build a community of devoted automatons.

Really grating read, narcissistic and at times dull. Someone who I think wanted the fame more than his ideal remote life. Have enjoyed other books by this author so while this one is not for me I would recommend her other books

A good read for the adventurous. This man has demonstrated the lifestyle of a superhero in bringing about the awareness for the survival of the species homo-sapiens. His driven nature leads one to feel for him, in his attempts to fullfill his destiny. The author does a good job in describing his life.

By the time I finished this book, I really disliked the author. Her thinly disguised disdain for Mr. Conway and his lifestyle were distasteful. I feel that this story is more important and larger than the author believes it is, and I really wish someone who "gets" him would write it. Ms. Gilbert most definitely does NOT get Mr. Conway or his lifestyle.

So far, it's an enjoyable read and Elizabeth Gilbert wrote it well, but nothing enlightening.. Eustace Conroy lives in the wild, but is not on the spiritual or philosophical plane as Thoreau or even another modern living out side the box person, Daniel Suelo, written about by Mark Sundeen in his work, "The Man Who Gave Up Money." Conroy's philosophy is more of a back to nature ideology rather than Thoreau's contemplation with nature.

As usual, I learned a lot reading one of Elizabeth Gilbert's books. It helped me understand men a bit more, taught me more about our country, and took me on many adventures. All lifelong pursuits of mine. I was enthralled from beginning to end, as I was with the two other books I have read by Elizabeth, "Eat, Pray, Love" and "Committed". It allowed me to open my mind and way of thinking about men who have control issues. It just makes sense to me. It is in their DNA. It is what has allowed us to survive this many years as a species. It has been a necessary evil. But....it is time to evolve. And this is where they need professional help, without it, they will never realize peace and happiness, and neither will the women who so want to be a part of their lives. This book enlightened me, allowed me to see men's dilemma from a whole new angle, and I love her for that!

I purchased this book after reading and loving "Eat, Pray, Love." I was not disappointed. This is a wonderful portrait of a human being who is so different, yet whose character strikes a familiar cord. Elizabeth's writing is wonderful and a pleasure to read. If you liked Eat, Pray, Love, you'll love this book as well!

I was expecting Chris Mccandless but got Buffalo Bill Cody. Less outdoorsman and more self-promoter and showman. Between that and the author's gushing over the main character, I found it difficult to become very interested.

I enjoyed reading this book and I have often dreamed of living the type of lifestyle that Eustace Conway lives, though not quite so harsh. It seems to me that his many hang-ups have created a personal "river" that no one is able to cross and join him. He seems to be a carbon copy of his father, with just enough minor differences to convince himself that he is nothing like him. Sadly, he has decided to turn away from the only source that could give him true happiness, a relationship with Jesus Christ. I think the old saying, "no one is as blind as he who refuses to see" fits Eustace well. His desire for acceptance from his father has blinded him to the joys of life. The disatisfaction that his apprentises experience and which Eustace cannot understand appears to stem largely from his use of them as slave labor. The expectations of those who come to work on Turtle Island are not the expectations of Eustace himself, which seems to be based on a phylosophy of, " hey, I dug a one hundred foot long ditch, three feet deep through solid rock! It took me two months and nearly killed me, and though I didn't really learn anything about living off the land, by golly I know I can dig a ditch through solid rock and knowing that gives me a warm feeling about who I am." No. The book gives the impression that the apprentises thought they were there to learn how to live off the land but Eustace failed to tell them that they were there to find out what he himself had always practised, "I will do one thing no matter how hard or how impossible it may seem until it kills me or I master it. Then I can stand straight and in my mind know that I am worth something if to no one but myself."
This is somewhat of a harsh review of a book about a man I've never met but it is based on the impression I got from the book. I wish you eventual happiness Mr. Conway. You've certainly strived for it.
I recommend this book.

The story of Eustace Conway is fascinating from both a society and psychological perspective. Anyone who might be interested in gender studies or controlling types of behavior, or anyone interested in wilderness study would most likely find it a compelling read. I found myself riveted personally through the whole thing, from the very first power-punched sentence.

Very interesting and well written. As a foreigner it is even more interesting to read about a person with that kind of view of his life.....
The family structure's damage how that can influence a person for, maybe, the rest of his life....I do not know how he feels now.

As a Christian, there are certain things about Eustace Conway's life that I cannot approve of, but I still must admit that many of his views and practices are good and need to be heard. This book helped convince me to quit my job and take the road trip I'd been dreaming about for years. I wish I had read this when I was younger and had less obligations keeping me from adopting or following in more of his footsteps.

It's a very good story. Gilbert can ramble sometimes, but usually gets right back to task. Also, I feel as though her own infatuation of him doesn't quite lend itself to a true accounting of his life. While she does let it escape that not everyone is fond of him, and that he has his personality issues, her doe-eyed view of him certainly comes through. Then there's also my personal opinion of him from reading this book - he seems like a pompous, egotistical, yet talented know-it-all. After reading the book, I feel like I want to learn some skills from him and then never see him again.

I appreciate very much Gilbert's view of the unique aspects of the American persona (rugged individualism, etc.). I'm not particularly well-read, much to my dismay, and am inspired by this book to read more on this topic. I also agree that Eustus Conway deserves a biography, for his integrity, his story, and the opportunity to explore the American pioneer persona. I am just a little disappointed in Gilbert's writing. Not what I expected after having read Eat, Pray, Love. I do think the book is worth reading and recommend it for a quick read.

I rarely read books about people unless it is someone I greatly admire. My brother gave me this book and suggested I read it, with the caveat that he had not read it yet but wanted to - so I gave it a shot.

While reading this book, I had multiple feelings about it. As it started I really like the book - the stories of Conway's youth were interesting, his abilities at a young age to survive outdoors were admirable and I could see him maturing into someone worthy of a book, looking forward to learning of his accomplishments later in life. As I read, it became clear Conway is not deserving of a book. I began to think he had the potential to be someone worthy of a book, but was not there yet. Then as the book went on I grew more and more tired of it - of him. The back of the book starts off by saying "The Last American Man is the story of Eustace Conway, a true American original." Bull. He is not an American Original, there have been Charlatans in America since the beginning, and make no mistake: Eustace Conway is a Charlatan in every sense of the word.

The author is clearly captivated with Conway, and pours praise on him throughout the book; she can quote Conway saying arrogant, hypocritical things and yet frame it with praise. Thankfully she quotes others who do not share her infatuation; others who give us an inkling of who Conway really is. If you only read one part of the whole book, read the conversation between the author and CuChullaine O'Reilly in Ch. 7, it explains Conway very well. It is unclear if O'Reilly has ever personally met Conway, but he is well aware of Conway's feats, and he puts it this way:

"[Conway has] reached a plateau in his life. He's pushed himself as far as he can go using his charisma and courage, and now he needs to go on a spiritual journey. He needs to do something that is private. He's postured himself in public for so many years that he doesn't know himself. There are parts of his soul he can't begin to understand, and until he learns those things about himself, he'll never be the nomad he's meant to be. He's a brave man, but he's not a spiritual pilgrim yet. Until he goes out into the world, all alone, and cuts away the ropes and publicity and ego and bulls*** and does something truly heroic, he's just blowing smoke up his own ass...he needs to get away from it all. He should stop trying to save the world." (pg. 189)

I couldn't have said it better. The book does a great job demonstrating Conway's problems, he is full of contradictions. If you pay him to speak to your group, you'll get a speech about how we should enjoy nature, yet he doesn't allow those who follow him to do just that. He is so focused on publicity that he rides across America on a horse for one singular reason - focused on one goal - and it has nothing to do with nature. He is focused on setting a world record, that of riding across America on a horse in the shortest time ever...others come along thinking it will be fun, thinking they can learn from him. But they can't. He is so focused on the world record and the shallow praise from the ignorant masses that he tramples over everyone in his path. People who could add meaning to his life are lost in his relentless quest of self-promotion and self-aggrandizement. He set another world record in a horse drawn buggy under similar circumstances. Then we get to hear over and over about his poor emotional state.

He travels around charging money to tell people to live simply and with nature and yet he buys a thousand acres and immediately starts clearing forests, building roads and buildings, and desires to someday live in a mansion with 40 foot cathedral ceilings.

The book ends with Conway categorically stating he is a fraud: "When I go out in public, I deliberately try to present myself as this wild guy who just came down off the mountain, and I'm aware that it's largely an act. I know I'm a showman." (pg. 266) He goes on to say he must do it for the benefit of the people. He could live a secluded life and actually practice what he preached but who would benefit? The world needs him to show them the way. We are so lost, Conway's duty is to let us know (in his own words) "If I say I'm right, then you can be sure I am right, because I don't make mistakes" (pg. 213) Funny thing, since the book is focused on the fact that he has made a lot of mistakes.

At the end of the day that is what I really grew fed up with. His life is a mess and he insists on blaming it on anyone but himself, he does what he does because the world needs him and the world is the cause of his messed up life. The author continually brings up his grandfather and father to offer an excuse to why Conway is the way he is, rarely if ever placing blame where it belongs. Why write a book about a messed up guy? What can we learn from this? Why in the world would we ever consider him the Last American Man? There are plenty of guys just like him - guys trying to make a living, dreaming of mansions on a hill, screwing up relationships. He is not much different from the Average American Man; he just has a different backdrop.

Liz Gilbert’s biography of Eustace Conway is in some respects painting a portrait of a zealot, who believed he could change the world. Whereas, as a result of the harsh modern realities in America, the world changed him and gradually forced him to adopt ways painfully in contrast to his ideal ways he believed in. His domineering and eccentric ways, possibly partly inherited from a very difficult relationship with his father when young, has led him down a very constrained path of development, and while achieving much fame and notoriety, did not broaden his influence in the way he had hoped. This was certainly partly due to simple luck: He was born at the wrong time in America. The biography and story Liz tells is one that shows how complex his world, and his life was. We live in an America today of very superficial relationships, very competitive, very manipulative, very far removed from the sacred contact with nature Eustace sought. Eustace has a different vision for America than career development and getting into the rat race. Many idealistic people and misfits get attracted to an alternative, until they become overwhelmed by the practical reality of what this means. Eustace has succeeded in keeping his utopian vision only at the cost of others submitting to him and being able to cope with the strength he demands. He has no tolerance for weakness.
His integrity and authenticity comes through in the book, and this does, to a certain extent, make him the last American man, relative to his truth and his ideals. To him, modern America is a pretty fake place, alienated and out of touch with the sacred. Liz tells a good story around this intense zealot, but Eustace as she portrays him, is in many ways out of touch with himself, not just the modern world. As a result, although I recommend the book as interesting, and Liz is an exceptionally talented writer, this biography is definitely about a quirky, too intense and domineering, and in some respects, unappealing individual, at least as she portrays him. For such a short book, this book comes across as deep and disturbing in some ways, not so much in going back to some primitive way of life or in respecting traditions, but in exploring some complex aspects of modern life that we see mirrored and contrasted in Eustace's life.

Contrary to my usual experience, I found most of the reviews on the store to poorly prepare me for this book or address my own impressions after reading it. People attack Conway for his temperament and character or Gilbert for her writing style and approach, yet few of the reviews captured what I found most intriguing about this novel and which is expertly threaded together at the very end like a surprise for the attentive reader.

To write a biography of a living person takes grit. Gilbert clearly earned the trust of Conway and many of his friends, family, exes and co-workers. Her approach seemed to be of an autobiographical tilt, sharing Eustace’s own understanding of himself to steer the novel. She also did a beautiful job of balancing specific scenes with the points of view of others. I found it respectful yet thorough.

My conclusion was not that Conway is a bad person. Quite the contrary, he is someone with high ideals and a perfectionist streak who finds it hard to teach others his way, even though that is his life goal. He’s baffled and perplexed and deserving of our compassion, because don’t we all have blind spots when it comes to goals and relationships and patterns?! My personal opinion is that he is trying to teach his apprentices not just skills or a lifestyle, but a character, a temperament, and that is just not something that can be taught. The people most capable of working with and appreciating Conway are the exact people that don’t need and/or would not likely reach out for his guidance.

I thoroughly enjoyed the read.

I found [The Last American Man] to be fascinating on many levels. It is a wonderfully told biographical story that describes Eustace Conway's world from both a micro perspective of his personal life and relationships as well as a macro perspective of the American cultural icon of a frontiersman.  examines the personality of frontiersmen and addresses the way these personality traits contributed to the development and expansion of the United States. Some of the mythical stories are perhaps "debunked" or perhaps just told more honestly, such as those of Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone. Eustace Conway is compared to and considered as a modern version of this icon and lives much of his life in the woods of North Carolina, learning to survive and thrive by killing and eating his own food, making his own clothes, etc. His micro story is that of an abused child finding escape. For readers interested in the psychohistory of the U.S. this is a must read. Is Conway driven by post traumatic stress disorder of which he has many symptoms, or perhaps bipolar disorder? This would be a great text for a psych class to analyze and diagnose Conway with detailed descriptions of his personal relationships and interactions. At the same time, if that is poppycock to you, it's just a great adventure story of living in the woods, as well as riding a horse across the continental United States. One of my all time favorites!

The Last American Man is the first non-fiction book by Elizabeth Gilbert, written four years before her highly-successful memoir, Eat, Pray, Love. It tells the story of Eustace Conway, an American Man who believes his mission in life is to show the American population that they can be strong and resourceful, grow their own food, fabricate their own clothes, make fire with 2 sticks, and save the planet. Eustace was taught and encouraged to learn the survival skills he needed to be able to live in the woods by his supportive mother whilst being constantly denigrated and ridiculed by his cruel and mentally abusive father. It is therefore a great wonder that he survived these opposing influences, that he was self-assured enough to become the living metaphor: the rugged frontiersman, explorer, pioneer that Americans could idolise. Gilbert describes a man who is passionate about what he believes to the point of having an uncompromising personality that fails to appreciate and encourage the efforts of good people around him. She does this with humour and insight, and the book is quite fascinating in places, even if the end is a bit light on. This is certainly a much better read than her later, hugely self-indulgent Eat, Pray, Love.

Elizabeth Gilbert paints an exacting portrait of a unique, if not vastly imperfect man, who embodies perhaps as much in spirit as in practice the tussle between dreams and realities of both succeeding and failing to live up to an ideal deemed worthy of his forebears. Eustace Conway, the title subject of the book, is profiled as a man heaped with unmovable desire to change the world by showing it how to live off the land, to master a world without modern conveniences and to conquer physically demanding nomadic travels known now only through legend. While marveling at all this Eustace has apparently conquered and taught himself to do, impressing so-called experts along the way, out comes the deeply ingrained social and practical limitations of Eustace Conway the human animal. Forever distanced from his unadoring father, limited to congeniality with siblings and always driving away a string of would-be companions we see an idolizer of nature, but see a man helplessly impossible as a social animal.

Gilbert's portrait is an exceptional and page-turning read. Her rendering of both his many qualities and faults appears almost too precise to be believed. We hear about not only his unmatched talents, but his imperfections as well. Both sides of that coin are presented as equitable, with no success being tempered without highlighting significant personal failings. Gilbert seems to capture what many men could likely relate to in their often own tenuous relationships with family, friends and lovers. Notwithstanding a handful of reviews and comments that claim Conway's failings are even greater than Gilbert recounts, the book is no less worthy of being read. It is not only a story of Eustace Conway, but a story that questions if there were ever any Eustace Conways in the history of America. Perhaps there are more similarities to Eustace Conway to today's American man that even Eustace Conway or even Elizabeth Gilbert would admit. Surely few can match Eustace's ability in nature, but likely many can equal and exceed his contradictions, his sense of desire for something greater, his insistence to do what he says rather than what he does and his incompetent and continuous ineptitude of interactions with others. In this sense, is he really the last American man or just another one who just happens to know hot to live in the woods? What makes this man, in that sense, really significantly unique than one who excels at physics, sports or rhetoric?