In most novels that have beautiful nature writing, nature only acts as a backdrop, a pretty painting and landscape to hold the real stories between people. I’d be spellbound reading those well-drawn details of beauty, of peace and green and spring. But The Overstory by Richard Powers takes it to another level, making those descriptions seem inadequate and superficial for something so grand and miraculous: trees. In response to the Overstory, the trees would say to the Romantic poets– Shelley, Byron, Keats, “You only like me for my looks? Nothing else?” Powers gives us that something else. He illuminates for us their history, biology, personifies their desires, fears, hopes, and very soul, beyond merely their commercial or aesthetic appeal. It brings forth the forest as an alive, dynamic system that’s buzzing with life and its own dramas at every moment, inside and underground.…
Arise, my darling; My fair one, come away! For now the winter is past, The rains are over and gone.
—The Song of Songs 2:10-11 (NJPS)
Jakob Wasserman’s soul scrutinized the members of the Burial Society as they began to clean under his nails and between his toes and to cut away several pieces of dried skin from his corpse. He asked the mal’akh ha-mavet if it would be all right to stay longer and observe the men working; he was curious. The angel consented and told Jakob they did not need to leave until after the burial.
The men preparing Jakob’s body were earnest about their work and meticulous in its execution. They had performed these purification rituals for many years. Even so, from time to time, Jakob would see what he believed to be an infraction of the correct procedure and wanted to bring it to the men’s attention.…
I got my first gerbil at age 10. They were exotic pets at the time, living primarily in the deserts of Asia. Where many school friends had hamsters, animals that are nocturnal, gerbils are daylight creatures. They are brown, fur covered, mouse-like rodents — but cuter — with long tails. When handling gerbils, you can harmlessly lift them by the base of their tail. I don’t remember from where we got him, but George came home for my birthday.
That summer I went to sleep away camp for the first time. During the month of July in 1969, I was at Camp Abelard in Upstate New York. Its predecessor was called Webatuck. A percentage of campers and staff that had been family at the abandoned grounds returned to what would now be called Abelard.…
In the early fifties the crowded tenement district in the old mill city where I grew up was gradually thinning out as families were beginning yet another migration into newer, more prosperous communities.
My mother had died when I was three and my father and I lived with my grandmother in one such tenement. She, like most of the older people there, spoke with a thick Italian accent, and most times it was easier for her to revert to her native Italian language.
I was thirteen the year I became a Freshman in the public high school which was located in a neighborhood unfamiliar to me. I didn’t realize it at the time but on that first morning, dressed in a new outfit she had sewn for me, I took my first steps away from the only world I had ever known.…
Death is my business, my bread and butter. So, you’d think, on my day off, I’d want to shut the door on it. But, I can’t help myself. I’m drawn to those newspaper articles. You know, those stories, hidden away amongst life’s trivia, about some poor soul who’s just been given the worst news imaginable; they’re dying. Devastating news for them and their loved ones but, newsworthy? Really?
As depressing as it is, a story about death and dying is compelling. I can’t stop myself. I read it. Diagnosed with some cruel illness which is slowly killing them, the person with the death sentence is quoted as saying, ‘I’m going to use the time I have left to make memories.’ They feel the urge to leave lingering proof that they were physically here.…
I stood on the shore and watched as Rebecca strode across the surface of the frozen lake, carrying an ax over her shoulder. I didn’t know what she was planning to do with it. When she called and told me to meet her at the park, I thought we would talk or eat lunch in the car. When I saw her walking across the lake, I thought maybe she was planning to do some ice fishing, even though she carried no equipment and had no expertise in the sport.
After she traveled about a hundred yards across the lake, she turned around, cupped her hands over her mouth, and yelled, “Come here, Robert. I have a surprise for you.”
