From A Timbered Choir, 1991:1 (p. 125-6).
The year begins with war.
Our bombs fall day and night,
Hour after hour, by death
Abroad appeasing wrath,
Folly, and greed at home.
Upon our giddy tower
We’d oversway the world.
Our hate comes down to kill
Those whom we do not see,
For we have given up
Our sight to those in power
And to machines, and now
Are blind to all the world.
This is a nation where
No lovely thing can last.
We trample, gouge, and blast;
The people leave the land;
The land flows to the sea.
Fine men and women die,
The fine old houses fall,
The fine old trees come down:
Highway and shopping mall
Still guarantee the right
And liberty to be
A peaceful murderer,
A murderous worshipper,
A slender glutton, or
A healthy whore. Forgiving
No enemy, forgiven
By none, we live the death
Of liberty become
What we have feared to be.
23 March 2007 at 8:38 am
Reading Wendell Berry isn’t as easy as riding down the road and hoping to see him at one his daughter’s events over at the Smith-Berry Winery. Instead, like most gifted writers, Wendell has a knack for posing questions that require meditation on the mysteries of life. Or put differently, I call attention to passage with which you’re probably already familiar in Jayber Crow. Jayber is talking to Dr. Ardmire just before deciding to leave seminary:
“You have been given questions to which you cannot be given answers. You will have to live them out – perhaps a little at a time.” [Dr. Ardmire]
“And how long is that going to take?” [Jayber]
“I don’t know. As long as you live, perhaps.”
“That could be a long time.”
“I will tell you a further mystery,” he said. “It may take longer.”
23 March 2007 at 9:51 am
Hi Parrot, for some reason Akismet dumped your comment into the spam folder. Just found it and restored it.
You’ve put up one of my favorite passages in Berry’s work. For anyone else reading this comment, you simply must read the novel Jayber Crow.
I totally agree with your assessment of Berry, too. I consider Berry to be one of the few remaining prophets; like Jesus himself, when we truly wrestle with his work, we find that he brings not peace, but a sword. This piece from A Timbered Choir is one of those moments; I mean, he wrote this in 1991, but it might as well have been written yesterday. The last dozen lines ought to haunt us for a long time.
23 March 2007 at 11:24 am
Robert Bellah quotes Wendell Berry’s words from Standing by Words, “In his protest, the contemporary poet is speaking publicly, but not as a spokesman; he is only one outraged citizen speaking at other citizens who do not know him, whom he does not know, and with whom he does not sympathize.”
I don’t want to hike with Wendell Berry. It is important that hiking partners have sympathy. I am afraid he would be preaching all day. One of my favorite nature writers is Loren Eisley. I don’t want to hike with him either. I have a melancholy side like him – we would sympathize with each other, so much that I am afraid we would make each other very depressed.
I meet a lot of people hiking alone in the wilderness. That is the ultimate idea of the Wilderness Act – solitude as much as preservation. The irony is that so many people hiking alone are anxious to talk to others – I should say talk “at” others, like Berry wrote. They want to tell you their story, they want to find a sympathetic ear. They give you their prophecy like Berry and lamentation like Eisley. I have noticed that these solitary hikers never ask questions – no sympathy.
I hike with my wife mainly. She speaks no prophecy and laments nothing. She is an athlete. I am an aesthete. She sets the pace. I interpret.
Would you want to hike with Berry?
23 March 2007 at 12:05 pm
Interesting question. I think I would, only because I think I’d like to hear stories while we go. I know that there are other readers of this site, too, who know Berry personally and who probably would be able to give us an idea of what he’s like beyond the books. I suspect he’s a lot less, hmm, pedantic in casual conversation than he is in the literature.
Maybe he’s rather like Jayber Crow himself.
JakeB? Parrot? Anyone else?
23 March 2007 at 12:41 pm
I haven’t had many interactions with Mr. Berry, though the couple of times we’ve spoken have meant a lot to me (I’m sure he’d say, “Uh, who are you???”). He’s not preachy; actually, he’s quite reserved until you get close to him, or judging from the beautiful atmosphere at the Smith-Berry Winery, until the music really kicks in…I think he’s pretty wary on the whole “celebrity prophet” thing that so many of his readers probably fall into.
I’ve had closer interactions with David Kline and Gene Logsdon, and even Tanya Berry (she is a true joy to speak with–very modest and embarrassed if you say anything about how grateful you are for the witness of their life together). They’re just people, like the rest of us schmucks, but they’ve committed to something for the long term. That makes them (sadly) unique, in this flitting day and age.
I’d say there are things about Wendell Berry that are similar to Jayber Crow — perhaps Jayber is Berry’s conception of his better self. I think if you want to look for insights into the man himself, you’ll have to study the character of Andy Catlett.
But…it’s fiction, you know.
I’d hike with Wendell in a heartbeat, if he’d have me.
23 March 2007 at 12:44 pm
Ken said:
This might be one of the best things I’ve ever read.
23 March 2007 at 3:13 pm
Okay, I would like to hike with Wendell Berry too! And Loren Eisley. And definitely JakeB! (Thanks for your kind words, JakeB.)
Actually, I meant to raise a little more abstract question than I did about what hiking means to us or what writings we associate our hiking with.
If someone said you can hike with one of the prophets, which one would you choose? I would choose Isaiah. He gives me hope. But if I had a wider choice than the prophets, I would take the Psalmist, especially so that we could talk Psalm 104.
If someone said you can hike with one of the nature writers, which one would you choose? First I would think of Thoreau, of course, but what I would really rather do is to visit him in his hut at Walden. Instead, I would probably choose Lawrence Hogue. He wrote All the Wild and Lonely Places which is a book of reflections about the meaning of wilderness set in the Anza Borrego Desert in Southern California. My wife likes him too!
Who would you take hiking with you from the Bible? Or, from the literary canon of nature writers?
23 March 2007 at 4:37 pm
What a stinking awesome question! Let me think…
As for the prophets, I think I’d like to hike with Hosea, although my wife would say I could use a keener sense of what injustice looks like, so Amos would perhaps be more instructive. But I’ve always liked that Hosea fellow, mostly because I’m pretty much a Gomer (and not the kind of “Gomer” that refers to certain bulls–look it up or email me), and Hosea was beautifully gentle and persistent (perhaps he had no choice, but…).
It’d be hard to pass up hiking with Wendell Berry, but I don’t really consider him a nature writer, so that leaves me with Edward Abbey (although maybe he wasn’t a nature writer, either). He was so full of piss and vinegar, and his stories about living in the desert are just terrificly vibrant and funny and irreverent that I think hiking with him would be a ton of fun.
Gary Snyder would be great to hike with, although he might sometimes lose me in the depths of his Zen; it would still be a terrific time.
Does Dr. Seuss count as a nature writer? I’d like that, too.
How about literary characters, and not just writers? I’d pick Konstantin Dmitrich Levin — from Anna Karenina. Remember the mowing scene? I know, I know…everyone likes that.
Because it’s good.
23 March 2007 at 6:09 pm
Other than Wendell Berry, I think I’d go with Bill Bryson and Barbara Kingsolver; for Biblical writers, definitely Isaiah’s my first choice, but I’d gladly go with Miriam and Job.
23 March 2007 at 6:42 pm
Responding to JakeB’s posting:
Hosea – what a great idea. And Gomer. I too can identify with her.
I think I will take Hosea with me in my thoughts tomorrow when I hike. A great dark cloud covered the top of the mountain yesterday and today where I will hike tomorrow. I plan to go up there to see what happened.
And Abbey and Snyder and Seuss – fine companions too.
I have not read Anna Karenina. I looked for the mowing passage. Are you referring to Part 3, Chapter 2? Konstantin Dmitrich Levin, from what I read about him, scanning a few chapters, and reading about him in a reader’s encyclopedia, does connect with Wendell Barry.
I also read that Konstantin Levin had an ideal marriage (but Anna did not) and when I put that together with Hosea and Gomer I see the marriage connection. That reminds me of the land of Beulah (married) and brings me back to the land and hiking. We do seek the land of Beulah. I think of it often when I hike. Last Fall my wife and I hiked through an area high in the mountains covered with bracken fern waste high as far as we could see. It had turned golden in the cold weather. I had the feelings that I imagine I would have upon arrival at the land of Beulah. It was hard to leave.
I don’t know what we may find tomorrow. But we will have Hosea with us. Thanks.
Responding to Benedict:
I have not read Bill Bryson or Barbara Kingsolver. A friend talks often of Bryson and his wit. Job, as I wrote before, is one of my favorites too. I don’t get the connection with Miriam.
23 March 2007 at 6:51 pm
Well, the connection I was making with Miriam was that she just strikes me as being totally in her element in the wilderness, to the point of expressing such sheer joy with an almost ferocious passion in her song in Exodus.
Bryson is a lot of fun. Do check him out!
24 March 2007 at 6:43 am
I think I’d rather hike with Bryson’s companion, Katz, in A Walk in the Woods:
I (Bill Bryson) sighed, unsure, then yanked the map out and examined it again. I looked from it to the logging road and back. “Well, it looks as if this logging road curves around a mountain and comes back near the trail on the other side. If it does and we can find it, then there’s a shelter we can get to. If we can’t get through, I don’t know, I guess we take the road back downhill to lower ground and see if can find a place out of the wind to camp.” I shrugged a little helplessly. “I don’t know. What do you think?”
Katz was looking at the sky, watching the flying snow. “Well, I think,” he said thoughtfully, “that I’d like to have a long hot soak in a jacuzzi, a big steak dinner with a baked potato and lots of sour cream, and I mean lots of sour cream, and then sex with the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders on a tiger skin rug in front of a roaring fire in one of those big stone fireplaces like you get in a lodge at a ski resort. You know the kind I mean?” He looked at me. I nodded. “That’s what I’d like. But I’m willing to try your plan if you think it will be more fun.”
24 March 2007 at 9:06 am
I see why you read Bryson and why Katz would be fun to hike with. This is so funny.
24 April 2009 at 3:42 am
I’m the only one in this world. Can please someone join me in this life? Or maybe death…
9 August 2013 at 5:39 am
I usually do not drop many comments, however i did a few searching and
wound up here An Evening With Wendell Berry and Harlan
Hubbard | Aedificium. And I actually do have a few questions for you if you usually do not mind.
Is it only me or does it appear like some of the comments come across like they are
left by brain dead visitors? 😛 And, if you are posting at other sites,
I would like to keep up with everything fresh you have to post.
Could you make a list of every one of all your public sites like your
linkedin profile, Facebook page or twitter feed?