The Country of Language (Credo) - Softcover

Sanders, Scott Russell

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1571312307 ISBN 13: 9781571312303

Publisher: Milkweed Editions, 1999

Synopsis

Scott Russell Sanders argues that people need to find a sense of "at-homeness" in the natural world because moments of interaction with the nonhuman world - whether one is transfixed by the sight of a great blue heron or enchanted by the voice of a creek - restore sanity and courage in the face of life's trials.

About this title

Review:

The country of language, in nature essayist and science-fiction writer Scott Russell Sanders's happy phrase, is the land that humans enter when, early in life, they learn to put words to things. Sanders writes with fine, measured humor of his passage into that terra incognita through episodes involving snakebite, guns, insects, and the other facts of life of his childhood along the Mississippi Delta and, later, in the woods of Ohio. Those episodes, he allows, may not have taken place just as he recalls them; after all, he was just a child, and "memory is a trickster, shifting shapes, playing jokes, reworking the past." True or not, they showcase Sanders's considerable abilities as an interpreter of the natural world and as a storyteller, abilities that have given birth to such fine books as Stone Country and Staying Put.

In other pieces in this brief volume in Milkweed Editions' Credo series, Sanders discusses the work of nature writing, a genre of literature that, as he puts it, speaks "for light and earth and water and air, for companions, for beauty, meaning, grace." Series editor Scott Slovic adds an essay on Sanders's vision and a bibliography of his publications, making this a useful resource for students and admirers of the writer's work. --Gregory McNamee

From Library Journal:

In his usual articulate and well-crafted prose, Sanders, author of over 20 books and numerous essays, continues to relate everyday and natural experiences to greater meanings. This addition to the publisher's "Credo" series includes an essay by Sanders describing how he became a writer, a biographical study of Sanders by Scott Slovis, and an extensive bibliography of Sanders's work. Sanders ties incidents from his life to his beliefs and development as an author. Recalling a time when he was lost in a farm field as a child, for instance, he concludes: "Unlike my father, I admit to having been well and truly lost....Instead of panicking, I try to welcome these moments...be still, and discover where I am." His writing, he says, is his way of asking questions and thinking about what troubles him; it is what makes his fleeting moments of insight durable. Recommended for academic and public libraries.ANancy Patterson Shires, East Carolina Univ., Greenville, NC
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Milkweed Editions
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 1571312307
• ISBN 13: 9781571312303
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 162