Alternately entitled: A Girl Writing; The Pet Goldfinch
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From youth to age we turn to books
in search of our true selves . . .
"When you were young
And your heart was an open book
You used to say live and let live
You know you did
You know you did
You know you did
But if this ever changin' world
In which we live in
Makes you give in and cry
Say live and let die . . ."
~ Paul & Linda McCartney ~
"When you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep . . ."
~ William Butler Yeats ~
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Steve Almond: "Literature exists to help people know themselves. . . . What I want to argue in this peculiar pint-sized ode is that our favorite novels aren't just books. They are manuals for living. We surrender ourselves to them for the pleasures they provide, and for the lessons they impart" (9, 15, emphasis added).
From his essay:
William Stoner and the Battle for the Inner Life
[Recommended by Ned; see also Stoner; and Victoria]
Madeleine L'Engle: "Journal entries for those days were earnest. I was reading as many letters of the great wrtiers as I could get hold of, and copying out the things that touched me closely. . . . Chekhov . . . Thoreau . . . Plato . . . Slowly I was learning who I was and who I wanted to be with the help of the great ones who had gone before me" (39 - 41, emphasis added).
From her autobiography:
Two - Part Invention: The Story of a Marriage
Marilynne Robinson: "Why do we need to read poetry? . . . Read it and you'll know why. If you still don't know, read it again. And again. Some of them took the things she said to heart, as she had done once when they were said to her. She was helping them to assume their humanity" (21, emphasis added).
From her novel
Home
So I asked myself: Who were the poets who helped me "assume my humanity"? Which "great ones" had paved the way? When did this process begin and with what authors?
For teen - age booksworms, particularly girls, a typical and time - honored answer might be Jane Austen, or the Bronte sisters. For me, however, it was Taylor Caldwell and Lloyd C. Douglas. Literary or not, these were the authors who inspired a summertime (1970 or so) quest to read if not their complete works, at least all that I could see on the library shelf.
Around the same time, my appreciation of poetry was kindled not by any one matchless poet but by the editor Ted Malone who introduced the selections in his anthology so tenderly that my heart was ready to honor each poem before I even read it. Next (1974 - 1980) came the early soul - searching and consciousness - raising poems of Naomi Shihab Nye; and eventually I gathered "who I was and who I wanted to be" from Edna St. Vincent Millay, Mary Oliver, Marge Piercy, Walt Whitman, Ernest ~ Sandeen (please see comment below).
When I asked Gerry about the idea of assuming one's humanity through literature, he named Charles Dickens and George Orwell. Unlike Gerry, who answered with no hesitation whatsoever, I confess to a few moments of consternation before settling on Franz Kafka and Virginia Woolf as the classic reading - list authors who most significantly provide pleasure, impart wisdom, and profoundly impact my way of understanding the world around me and the world inside my head.
A couple of summer's ago, my friend Don Lynam suggested that we all share our "list of books that have survived multiple purges." So many people posted so many intriguing titles, ranging from classics tried and true to others lesser known, with a generous sprinkling of curious, eccentric, and unique choices! Each item, thoughtfully chosen, had undoubtedly aided the various contributors in the assumption of their humanity.
The titles on my personal list overlapped with many already included in Don's survey, so I added only two: my all - time favorite The Master & Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov; and, on Gerry's behalf, Diary of a Man in Despair by Friedrich Reck-Malleczewen.
In closing, here are a few life - changing, mostly non-fiction "manuals for living" that would survive any purge of mine. If you are in search of life coach advice, try delving into -- or even just skimming -- nearly anything written by . . .
Brian Andreas - poetic cartoonist
Bill Bryson
Paul Collins - Not Even Wrong
Joan Didion - "On Keeping a Notebook" ~ "On Self - Respect" ~
"In Bed: On Migraines"
Andrea Dworkin
Marilyn French - The Women's Room
Stephen Jay Gould
Anne Lamott ~ Turning 60 / 61
Alan Parsons - lyricist
Leonard Shlain - The Alphabet Versus the Goddess
Sarah Vowell
Barbara G. Walker - The Skeptical Feminist: Discovering the Virgin, Mother, and Crone
And three plays:
The Fantasticks
Our Town ~ "The Least Important Day"
Stop the World -- I Want to Get Off
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10203454156582048&set=a.1133770111909&type=3&theater
ReplyDeleteTo my friend Kathie O'G: Do you remember meeting Mr. & Mrs. Sandeen at ND? They actually attended an English Dept. party at my house in 1985 -- a brush with greatness! Too bad I didn't have the presence of mind to take their photograph or get his autograph. So many of his poems are excellent; I refer to his complete works again and again.
Reply from Kathie: Well, Kitti, this will be a rather different answer than you'd expect, perhaps! I actually took a class with Ernest Sandeen, and it met at his house. You may recall a post I had up about a beloved of mine who was murdered during my first semester as a grad. student at Notre Dame, and in it, I said among the few things I remembered from that entire year, much of which is truly blank, was the immense kindness of faculty and fellow grad. students.
Well, Ernest Sandeen was chief among them. We met at his home for 3 hours once a week, and we'd take a half hour break mid-class for some homemade treat Eileen, his wife, would have prepared for us. When Beansie was murdered, I went home for the funeral and came back to campus for a week or so before heading home again for Thanksgiving. When I got back to South Bend, my housemates told me an older gentleman had walked over to our place to hand-deliver a note he'd written to me.
It was Professor Sandeen. His gentility and deep and abiding kindness to me during that time is a memory I'll always treasure. We talked at some length that week on several occasions about love and loss and who knows what else; he was always very paternal and certainly never more so than then. It always felt as if we had a special bond because of that, though I'm sure all of his students felt special for different reasons. He just had that kind of presence.
But also, your asking me this in this thread is very touching in a different way. I had written and then deleted a note saying today, July 18, was also MY father's birthday! He died in 1991. I deleted it because I thought the thread was more for your family than any interlopers like me. And, well. . .here we are! Thanks for asking!
P.S. to Kathie: "This is one of the best stories ever! Thanks so much for interloping!
And from our friend Laura:
ReplyDeleteDear Kitti,
Especially enjoyed your entries on "To Assume My Humanity" and Kathie O'Gorman's wonderful words about Ernest Sandeen! I remember him so well. Although he was retired when I knew him, I remember being invited to his home for lovely long talks with scholars and poets, and later Paul and I would visit the Sandeens for walks around the yard, a little cooking with Eileen, always wonderful discussions. (Later still we were invited to lunch with Ernest, because Eileen wanted to demonstrate how adept she'd become at managing his feeding tube! The "lunch" lasted one and a half minutes, and we all had a good chuckle about it.)
Kathie's and your memories also prompted me to seek out his books, and I was delighted to find that I had saved one of his letters (always signed Ernest and Eileen) stuck in the Dec. 1986 volume of Poetry magazine he had given me. (He had four poems in that issue and had written a note in it too.) His words move me to tears even now--
Laura
https://dailykitticarriker.blogspot.com/2009/07/not-unworthy.html
ReplyDeleteRE: Paul Collins: https://bookishbeck.wordpress.com/2020/09/08/hay-on-wye-trip-sixpence-house-reread/
ReplyDelete