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Norman Maclean’s novel A River Runs Through It is a variation on the tale of the prodigal son, represented by the narrator’s younger brother Paul, a gifted fly fisherman and newspaper reporter.
Prior to reading Rebecca Solnit’s A Field Guide to Getting Lost, I had assumed it was about getting lost in the physical sense, for the sake of exploring and enjoying the natural world. It is not that.
Thanks mostly to the incredible work of the local bookstore chain Politics and Prose, I’ve seen some of my favorite authors and chatted, oh so briefly, with them after collecting their signatures. For someone who loves listening to authors talk, my cup runneth over.
Anyone who is a writer is also a researcher. Stories sprung from one’s imagination are not exempt from these duties. Fiction writers frequently write about a time and place they know—think Conrad and the Congo in The Heart of Darkness or Harper Lee and the rural South. Similarly, writers become interested in a time or…
The smartphone wasn’t specifically prophesized by either Aldous Huxley in Brave New World or George Orwell in 1984, but the device is a manifestation of the dark vision both men had for how human beings relate to one another.
One of the gifts Thich Nhat Hanh has in common with some of my other favorite authors is that when I read him I feel as if he is letting me and me alone in on a secret.
Robert Pirsig died last month at the age of eighty-eight. His death was covered widely, but within a day or two it had been washed away by the torrent of offenses and outrages known as the “news cycle.”
In my mind, Joan Didion and Annie Dillard are linked, two sides to the same coin, one the yin to the other’s yang. This is unfair to both women.
As our world has become less personal, more reliant on screens and therefore removed from the natural world, a certain cohort finds itself being pulled toward nature. Consider the rise of urban farming, sustainable agriculture, and food co-operatives. People have looked to the past to find the kind of independence no gadget can offer.
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