Dying and Living on the Kansas Prairie: A Diary - Hardcover

Rutledge, Carol Brunner

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0700606491 ISBN 13: 9780700606498

Publisher: Univ Pr of Kansas, 1994

Synopsis

This is Carol Brunner Rutledge's diary of the three months preceding the death of her mother, Alice. With quiet eloquence she celebrates her mother's life and guides us on a journey from anguish and doubt through self-discovery and healing. In the tradition of earlier plainswomen, she fuses deeply personal emotions with universal themes tied to family, community, religion, and work - amidst the stark beauty of the Flint Hills.
Rutledge vividly describes the people and the seasons of the prairie, providing insight into how generations of tall-grass people have related to the land. She offers nostalgic memories of her childhood and family history, as well as reflections on the Kansas pioneer spirit and its special brand of humor.
Rutledge also records with excruciating honesty her frustration at the insensitivity of high-tech medical professionals who ignore her mother's strong spirit while continuing to labor over a body that no longer works. Rising above these false hopes, mother and daughter forge an even stronger bond as they come to understand that dying is a natural part of living.
Throughout, the silent, powerful prairie provides solace and strength.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

"Rutledge is direct, honest, unafraid, probing, questioning, informative. Her book is at once intensely personal and universally important. Her fine and moving diary understands the prairie, speaks to fundamental Midwestern values, and makes me glad to live in Kansas, near the hills she writes of so eloquently."--Thomas Fox Averill, editor of What Kansas Means to Me

"I was very moved by this book. At its best, it is a contemporary journal that parallels many plainswomen's writings from a century ago. It has the same freshness, honesty, lack of pretension and provides us with an oftentimes ignored view of an 'ordinary' woman's life on the plains."--Mary Swander, author of Driving the Body Back

About the Author:

Carol Brunner Rutledge is the author of five local histories and The Story of Wichita, a nonsexist and multi-ethnic textbook used in Wichita public schools. She has also written and produced two one-act plays and four documentaries for educational television and performed her one-woman show, "I Am Kansas Woman," more than 200 times.

About this edition

• Publisher: Univ Pr of Kansas
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0700606491
• ISBN 13: 9780700606498
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 224