River of Shadows : Eadweard Muybridge and the Technological Wild West

Author: Solnit, Rebecca

Individual photographers

Published on 22 May 2025 by GRANTA BOOKS in the United Kingdom.

Paperback / softback | 320 pages
128 x 199 x 21 | 220g

In 1872, Eadward Muybridge - a British photographer, who had landed in California during the Gold Rush - captured images of high-speed movement. These photographs would go on to lay the foundations for motion pictures, changing the west coast of America, and the world, forever. River of Shadows is both a bold and original biography of a true pioneer - his trailblazing work, and his complicated life - and a portrait of America on the threshold of modernity. Drawing lines from Muybridge's invention to Hollywood and Silicon Valley, Rebecca Solnit explores how this remarkable breakthrough has shaped the world today.