An elegiac sort-of tone poem in written word to summon the essence of place, time, & rhythm of everyday existence. Life and death are on display amongst a solipsistic background examining the intricate balance of life on its own terms often desolate of meaning. It is a short but dense meandering that will for me at least require additional readings over time to grasp its full effect.

A friend of mine loaned me this little book, saying that it is her favorite book in the world and that she's read it many times. I was a bit skeptical, but took it anyway because I respect her taste in many things, but especially literature.

Dillard's writing is absolutely breathtaking--I can think of no other word for it. She addresses some of the most painful human questions in the most beautiful way. After I return this book to my friend, I plan to buy my own copy, give it to friends, and read it over and over again.

Very good. I don't really have a category for this one, so I filed it under philosophy.

I read this book in a literary theory class as a sophomore in college, and it shook the very foundations of my thought. I know this sounds (and is) vague, but this is a book about EVERYTHING, written with poetic economy, concrete images, and, I imagine, some kind of grace. Dillard reflects on what it means to be an artist (it's being a nun, being a moth on fire, being a little girl burned, being a tired, burnt out writer), and in the process takes on time, mortality, and fury at the spitefulness of God, while trying, again and again, to move towards some kind of peace, all at the edge of the North American continent, the Puget Sound. I just can't convey what the experience of reading this book is like, except to say this: you must be willing to read slowly, out loud, and savor every word, because literally every word is important. Just a "wow" kind of a book, and, according to Dillard, her best.

سرد تأملي شاعري.
الجميل هو رؤية دور النشر تترجم أنماطا جديدة من السرد خارج السائد.
الترجمة ممتازة.

ik houd veel van Dillards schrijfsels & kan dit alleen met moeite maar drie sterren geven. het bewijst wederom haar grote geest en haar toewijding aan de natuurlijke wereld, maar het laatste deeltje is zo christelijk getint dat het me niet iedere keer lukt 'God' te vervangen door, welke naam zal ik het geven.. dat wat deze wereld vorm geeft? haar Pilgrim-boek laat ruimte voor interpretatie, dit boek niet. & dat stoort. (ik
vind het typisch menselijk/ nogal arrogant iets te bedenken dat we niet begrijpen als verklaring voor iets anders dat we niet begrijpen, waardoor de illusie ontstaat dat we toch iets wél begrijpen.)

Yesterday I felt like going to the Arboretum and reading some Annie Dillard, so I chose this book and a lovely maple to sit by and enjoyed both very much. I won't explain here what this book is about, because finding out what it is about was part of what made this short book so enjoyable. Dillard wrote this book while she was living in Puget Sound and, like in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, writes a clever mixture of reflections on nature, God, and various fascinating facts that she has read about the world and/or philosophy. This combination wouldn't work for most authors, but she is so great at it that it really works. The book is moving and profound, but written in such an earthy way that it didn't feel pretentious. I recommend it as a good afternoon or short vacation read.

In brief, this book is one case where I'd urge readers of this review to go find more interesting reviews of it to read, I imagine this one has spawned passionate comments from thousands of readers and writers. The beginning two sentences read like a revelation:

"Every day is a god, each day is a god, and holiness holds forth in time. I worship each god, I praise each day splintered down and wrapped in time like a husk, a husk of many colors spreading, at dawn fast over the mountains split."

I wish I could remember those lines each morning when I wake up. The curious thing is that the book itself reads like an extended poem, or a prose poem, and I don't know how it can be categorized. I love the book simply for those first two sentences - that's enough, actually, for me, and I could stop there and be happy with it.

" بَدونا متشابهتين بعض الشيء. وجهها الآن مشوّه، وأنا لا أتذكر وجهي. إنها أفضل النكات على الإطلاق، أننا هنا، وحمقى - أننا مبذورون في الزمن مثل حبوب قمح كثيرة جداً، أننا أرواح مرشوشة جزافاً كالملح في الزمن وذائبة هنا، مبثوثة في المادة، ومتصلة عبر الخلايا إلى أسفل أقدامنا، وتلك الأقدام مرجّح أن تصرعنا فوق جذر شجرة أو تسحقنا على حجر. النكتة في هذا أننا ننسى. أعطِ العقل ثانيتين لوحده، وسيظن أنه فيثاغورس. نصحو مئة مرة في اليوم ونضحك. "

2023 Update
This year, I decided to read Holy the Firm once every month as part of a practice of returning to texts that have been formative for my understanding of my self in some significant way. I'd like to update this review along the way with some form of reflection.

January 2023: Returning here I am shocked at how resonant this language is with my interior monologue. These are phrases, words, and images that still run through my thoughts on a weekly, if not daily, basis, and in many instances I had forgotten where I found them originally here, in Annie's hard little book.

February 2023: Craft, craft, craft--all driving toward that final entry into a specific type of witness, the monastic (I'll be your nun, I already am now). When I was younger and reading this book, I read this as a kind of inscribed devotion following the extended meditation on the scorching of the divine, but older now, the text speaks more directly of confrontation and defiance (more Job 2.0) and the monastic mode carries with it an extension of trauma.

In my top ten all-time favorites. Dillard's prose is haunting. Moths have never seemed the same since.

Just yesterday someone told me that Annie Dillard has said this is one of her least favorite books. Regardless, her self-standards are exceptionally high, and amongst our choices, her "worst" works must still be some of the most profound in thought and most unique in their creativeness.

I haven't read much Dillard, but each time I do, I am astounded by her attention to detail and by her ability to create shockingly clear images with words. Indeed, her gift for using words is beyond explanation. One must experience her writing to see that, truly, using words in unique combination allows her to express ideas in a way no one else ever has. It is almost as if she understands the world in another language and yet is able to translate this other understanding into English for those of us less gifted in vision.

Holy the Firm might blow out of your window and fly away on a windy day; it's a skinny little 76 pages, weighted with the contemplation of a much larger work. Dillard questions the injustices and sufferings of life without feeling obligated to express the skeptic's doubt in the power and goodness of God. I think she would say this is not our realm. Rather, we must realize our own responsibility, to observe, to blunder, to turn our heads and blink our eyes in constant awe. Humility and gratitude are mixed with honest but unaffected sorrow. One suspects that laughter may be both Dillard's way of expressing joy as well as a substitute for her tears. She does seem to be, as Van Morrison would say, one who has "let go into the mystery."

Some favorite quotes:

(To a little two year old boy) "Hullo, short and relatively new. Welcome again to the land of the living, to time, this hill of beans."

"I often think of the set pieces of liturgy as certain words which people have successfully addressed to God without their getting killed."

"There are no events but thoughts and the heart's hard turning, the heart's slow learning where to love and whom. The rest is merely gossip, and tales for other times."

"There is no such thing as an artist: there is only the world, lit or unlit as the light allows."

"Ladies and gentlemen! You are given insects, and birdsong, and replenishing series of clouds."

One woman's examination of life, suffering, the divine and the worthlessness of making sense of it all.