Mentored by Books Part II: Learning to Speak Metaphor

Essential Oils

Annie Dillard speaks metaphor in the images she writes about, in the stories she tells and in her books. It’s this way of telling story that has the power to transport.

In her book American Childhood, Annie Dillard recounts memories with clarity, not only of mind, but of heart. One of her memories in particular, one about a young ice-skater spinning in the snow, under a lamp post, isolated and alone in the dark except the light of the lamp carried me into my own place, rather suspended in time. I came to own that memory, not its details, but its essence. It was mine because in capturing that image, she spoke the magical language of metaphor.

Dillard has the know how to articulate universal themes that are cliché’ free. In Teaching a Stone to Talk Dillard weaves her essays into tapestries using the colorful threads of image and symbol, each image itself worthy to linger over, each essay an artful expression of an old and larger story we long to have retold. In one of the essays in that book, “An Expedition to the Pole,” I am pulled forward with an obsession to discover the meaning of the juxtaposition of two disparate subjects. With a stroke of artistic genius she lays side by side the story of the ragged stumbling forward of a church congregation and the grand and lauded Polar expeditions undertaken by Peary and Henson and others. I’ll leave you to your own discovery and only hint at some highlights of “dancing circus bears” and “…skeletons from…the frozen sea” as an enticement.

In her book Holy the Firm, Dillard carries her power of metaphor to another level. In this small but weighty volume we wrestle with and awaken to archetypal themes embedded in the ordinary, because Dillard lives into them in her writing and takes us with her. In the book she distills a poignant three-day period into something akin to an essential oil, the smallest drop releasing an aroma that touches something instinctual in our being, something out of reach in our usual route to understanding. This volume is metaphor, it’s parts are made up of metaphor, it’s symbolic images are the building blocks creating a space for us to grasp the ungraspable.

Getting to know someone takes a substantial investment. When you’re putting yourself under the mentorship of an author, reading large volumes like Leaves of Grass or Walden’s Pond can simulate deep conversation. And yet reading a number of smaller works by an author can create a deep rapport as well. Many of Annie Dillard’s books are smaller volumes, but contain no less heft in their essence.

Dillard encourages people to actually get to know her. On her website www.anniedillard.com she says “The way to learn about a writer is to read the text. Or texts.” I’ve learned some things in my brief conversations with her work.

First, in order for writing to have depth it must move the writer into a sort of no man’s land beyond knowledge, where living hard into experience leaves a mark. There’s a cost involved that is apparent in her writing. Also I’ve seen in her work a deep respect and reverence for the day-to-day life we all live, the miracles that are inherent in breaking through to their underlying beauty. And lastly I’ve cried with Annie, even today as I’ve fact checked my post, I’ve felt her heart again and cried with her. So I guess I’ve learned how to “be one with” …a really valuable lesson.

When was the last time you were "one with" an author?

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