The Story of My Heart"The Williamses anchor Jefferies' profound inquiry to our churning world and illuminate their own passionate quests for truth and understanding." —BOOKLIST, starred review While browsing a Stonington, Maine, bookstore, Brooke Williams and Terry Tempest Williams discovered a rare copy of an exquisite autobiography by nineteenth–century British nature writer Richard Jefferies, who develops his understanding of a "soul-life" while wandering the wild countryside of Wiltshire, England. Brooke and Terry, like John Fowles, Henry Miller, and Rachel Carson before, were inspired by the prescient words of this visionary writer, who describes ineffable feelings of being at one with nature. In an introduction and essays set alongside Jefferies' writing, the Williams share their personal pilgrimage to Wiltshire to understand this man of "cosmic consciousness" and how their exploration of Jefferies deepened their own relationship while illuminating dilemmas of modernity, the intrinsic need for wildness, and what it means to be human in the twenty–first century. JOHN RICHARD JEFFERIES (6 November 1848 – 14 August 1887) was a British novelist and essayist who helped pioneer the field of modern nature writing. Jefferies described the English countryside with an intimate vividness and expansive passion that inspired both his contemporaries and later writers. TERRY TEMPEST WILLIAMS is the author of fourteen books including Erosion: Essays of Undoing, Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place, and When Women Were Birds. Recipient of John Simon Guggenheim and Lannan Literary Fellowships in creative nonfiction, she is the Provostial Scholar at Dartmouth College. Her work has been anthologized and translated world–wide. BROOKE WILLIAMS has spent thirty years advocating for wildness, most recently with the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance and as the Executive Director of the Murie Center in Moose, Wyoming. He holds an MBA in Sustainable Business from the Bainbridge Graduate Institute and a Biology degree from the University of Utah. He has written four books including Halflives: Reconciling Work and Wildness, and dozens of articles. He is involved in The Great West Institute, a think tank exploring expansion and innovation in the conservation movement and is currently working on a book about ground–truthing. Brooke and Terry have been married since 1975. They live with their dogs in Jackson, Wyoming, and Castle Valley, Utah. |
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beauty become began believe body breath Brooke called cause CHAPTER circle consciousness continued death deep deity desire discovered eagle earth equal eternal everything existence experience eyes face feel felt follow force give grass green hand head Heart higher hills Horse hour human ideal ideas immortality inner known labour leave less light lines living look meaning mind moved nature never night ocean once owers passed past peak experience perfect physical possible prayed prayer present pure remain rest Richard Jeeries rise round runs seemed sense shape side soul soul-life stand stars Story strength summer Terry things thought thousand tion touch train trees universe unknown walk watch whole wild wind wonder writes written wrote