Writing from the Center - Hardcover

Sanders, Scott Russell

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0253329418 ISBN 13: 9780253329417

Publisher: Indiana University Press, 1995

Synopsis

Writing from the Center is about one very fine writer's quest for a meaningful and moral life. The center he seeks and describes is geographical, emotional, artistic, and spiritual - and it is rooted in place. The geography is midwestern, the impulses are universal. Where and how do we find meaning? Where does a writer find inspiration? How can personal, artistic, family, and community needs be blended to create a harmonious life? What aids exist in such a "located" life against despair? How should a writer relate to and represent his place? Twelve interrelated essays probe these questions from different perspectives. "Buckeye" examines the resonance of objects and the mysteries of relationships and death. "Imagining the Midwest" surveys how other writers have seen and related to their region. "The Common Life" makes an eloquent case for community values. "Sanctuary" is an eloquent and painful consideration of environmental degradation. "Writing from the Center" and "Letter to a Reader" deal with Sanders's decisions to locate in the Midwest, to know his place, and to write about it in both fiction and nonfiction.

About this title

About the Author

Scott Russell Sanders is Professor of English at Indiana University, Bloomington.

From the Back Cover

Writing from the Center is about one very fine writer's quest for a meaningful and moral life. The center he seeks and describes is geographical, emotional, artistic, and spiritual - and it is rooted in place. The geography is midwestern, the impulses are universal. Where and how do we find meaning? Where does a writer find inspiration? How can personal, artistic, family, and community needs be blended to create a harmonious life? What aids exist in such a ""located"" life against despair? How should a writer relate to and represent his place? Twelve interrelated essays probe these questions from different perspectives. ""Buckeye"" examines the resonance of objects and the mysteries of relationships and death. ""Imagining the Midwest"" surveys how other writers have seen and related to their region. ""The Common Life"" makes an eloquent case for community values. ""Sanctuary"" is an eloquent and painful consideration of environmental degradation. ""Writing from the Center"" and ""Letter to a Reader"" deal with Sanders's decisions to locate in the Midwest, to know his place, and to write about it in both fiction and nonfiction.

Reviews

YA?The essays in this collection can stand alone, but together they complete the picture of a self-described writer of place whose place is the Midwest. Sanders's themes include "...our place in nature, our murderous and ingenious technology, the possibilities of community, love and strife within families, the search for a spiritual ground." At the same time, the author offers 12 examples of clear, concise, lyrical writing. In the essay "Voyageurs," a father and daughter paddle a canoe together and learn more about one another as they face danger in the wilderness of northern Minnesota. YAs will find both inspiration and hard truths about creative writing as a career in essays such as "Writing from the Center," "The Writer in the University," and "Letter to a Reader." There is also much here for those interested in discovering what in the world around them is essential to their own well-being.?Molly Connally, Kings Park Library, Fairfax County, VA
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

In this collection of 12 essays, Sanders (English, Indiana Univ.) writes about family, community, the natural world, the Midwest, the art of writing, academia, and his own life. Sanders has published nonfiction, fiction, and children's works to some acclaim; he writes, he says, to glimpse the condition of wholeness that occurs when individuals are not separate from their fellow beings and communities are one with the natural world. "The earth needs fewer tourists and more inhabitants, it seems to me?fewer people who float about in bubbles of money and more people committed to knowing and tending their homeground." Consequently, he finds himself baking bread or canoeing with his daughter. Some of his essays have been published previously; they sometimes overlap or fail to acknowledge each other, but they are essays of substance and beauty, and they belong beside the work of Annie Dillard, Samuel Pickering, and Wendell Berry. For both academic and public library collections.?Nancy Shires, East Carolina Univ., Greenville, N.C.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Indiana University Press
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0253329418
• ISBN 13: 9780253329417
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 196