BARRY LOPEZ was born in 1945 in Port Chester, New York. He grew up in southern California and New York City and attended college in the Midwest before moving to Oregon, where he has lived since 1968. He is an essayist, author, and short story writer, and has traveled extensively in remote parts of the world. Recent trips have taken him to the Tanami Desert in Australia's Northern Territory, into the Transantarctic Mountains, and to northern Kenya.