Review by Eric D. Lehman, Professor of English at the University of Bridgeport in Connecticut. Review is linked to Umbrella: a journal of poetry and kindred prose
Note: While this book was published in 2003, it is a classic that VTH readers will want to make the acquaintance of, if they haven't already!
When someone comes up with a fresh and startling way of looking at our world, you can bet that it is drawn from a combination of sources, fields, and disciplines. Gary Snyder has done just this with The Practice of the Wild: Essays joining his backgrounds in mythology, history, religion, literature, anthropology, language, and natural history. The result is a series of interlocking essays that present new approaches and methods for recovering our shared world.
Snyder approaches “nature” from oblique angles, sometimes leaping across a boulder field, sometimes running switchbacks up a trail, and sometimes traveling down the mountain rather than up. The project of the entire book is clear, however: “Is it possible that a society as a whole might stay on better terms with nature, and not simply by being foragers?” In essays like “The Place, The Region, and the Commons” and “Good, Wild, Sacred” he gives possibilities for that interaction. Read more of this review here.
Beth's Note: Gary Snyder and Terry Tempest Williams are two contemporary nature writers that I read regularly. Here's one of my favorite quotes from Gary Snyder:
The point is to make intimate contact with the real world, the real self. Sacred refers to that which takes us out of our little selves into the whole mountains-and-rivers mandala universe...nature is not a place to visit, it is home.
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About Beth Patterson
The Virtual Tea House website became 'word-ripe' when, over a cup of jasmine green, I realized that the web has an expanding part to play in the communal aspects of spiritual growth.
One of my favorite hats, among several is: initiated firekeeper in the Sacred Fire Community. Hosting a monthly community fire circle, I'm being taught that the simple act of sitting around a fire with the intent of holding open-hearted space makes for some soulful community!
With a master's degree in religion, my career spans 20 years in end of life care and I currently work in the field of child abuse intervention and advocacy.
Here in beautiful Central Oregon, my spiritual homes of the high desert and the mountains are both in proximity. And for good measure, four hours away is Grandmother Ocean and the stunning Oregon Coast.
I'm making decent progress on the goal set by my mother early on: she taught us that the goal of humanity should be to become ever-more eccentric, i.e. more fully human.
Entering the 'forest-dweller' phase of life, I am honored to host the Virtual Tea House for all who wish to explore how our lives are enriched and made new a thousand times each day by the spirituality we embody. Exploring this engagement together is the purpose of the Virtual Tea House.
Welcome! Let's have a cup of virtual tea together and share what brings us joy, what we are being taught by life, how we are leaning into the Big Questions posed to us each day in sometimes 'distressing disguises'.