Gilead
by Marilynne Robinson
|
|
| published
|
2004
by Harper Collins Canada
|
| first published
| 2006 |
| binding
| Hardcover |
| isbn
|
0002005883
(isbn13: 9780002005883)
|
| literary awards
| Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (2005); 2004 National Book Critics Circle Award Winner |
| date added
|
12-19-06
|
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Read in November, 2007
Dear Son:
The Too-Little-Too-Late Dilemma of Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead
It’s deceptively tempting to approach a book like Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead, and see only the main character’s theological musings. After all, in a novel about an old man reminiscing about faith and family, there’s a plethora of weighty spiritual content; everything from careful exegesis of Genesis 22 to references to Karl Barth’s Epistle to the Romans. Needless to say, this is no simple “I remember when...more
Dear Son:
The Too-Little-Too-Late Dilemma of Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead
It’s deceptively tempting to approach a book like Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead, and see only the main character’s theological musings. After all, in a novel about an old man reminiscing about faith and family, there’s a plethora of weighty spiritual content; everything from careful exegesis of Genesis 22 to references to Karl Barth’s Epistle to the Romans. Needless to say, this is no simple “I remember when…” fable of love and loss. Issues are being grappled with, weighed and eschewed. However, to review the novel from a theological stance cannot merely mean discussing old John Ames’ opinions on war, forgiveness or predestination. That job belongs primarily to his congregants and family within the narrative. The question I, the reader, encountered was of the theology of a book wherein the entire premise is of a man wishing to leave a testament of his “better self” (p. 202) for his seven year old, but spends his final days journaling, instead of spending time with his son. This is the battle I fought with John Ames and Marilynne Robinson throughout my reading.
It began when I realized that about every four pages I found myelf drowsing off to sleep, or thinking of topics far beyond the narrator’s journal entries. As I had approached the novel with great enthusiasm (fiction at last!) I wondered what could be sending my mind off into orbit. Why the dissociation? From the frustration with not being able to stay focused from page to page, paragraph to paragraph, soon emerged actual anger. I found myself choosing to put the book down and find other activities, almost as if to spite the narrator. Something was wrong. I was refusing to sit passively and listen.
With a little reflection, this is what I discovered. I was incredibly angry that John Ames was writing on and on about how much he loved his son and his wife and how he wished he wasn't about to die, and there he was, “reflecting” instead of living! Enter the transference. I realized how little tolerance I had for the “nobility” of a strong, silent-type preacher man finally unloading the deepest parts of his heart and soul onto paper, instead of through interaction. The drowsiness coming over me was of not wanting to listen to this man write. I wanted to see him take action. I didn’t want to honor him by reading his last testament, because I do not respect the idea that somehow, as long as you say what you feel before you die, it doesn’t matter how little you expressed to those around you until that point. The book brought up anger with my father, his father, and the generations of quiet, long-suffering, missionary-type men I am descended from. Though I am not a man, nor very quiet, I know about long-suffering, and I could not suffer the boredom or veiled anger that lay between the lines of John Ames’ memoirs. I wanted to rip the journal from his hands, and essentially, tell Marilynne Robinson that I refuse to applaud her character’s poetry, theology or self-reflection, when he is in essence, taking the easy way out of sharing himself.
I’ll admit, there are plenty of passages in the novel that show Ames’ growth and interaction with others. Even the fact that he married late in life reveals that he was unsatisfied persisting in the loneliness of listening to baseball games on the radio, writing sermons and hiding from neighbors when they knocked on his door. However, all his loving descriptions of sunsets, children’s laughter and the smell of raindrops, appear hollow the moment he starts describing his son playing outside as he writes. In that the entire purpose of the novel is for this aging father to express his heart to his son, for all the descriptions of moments of communion, (p. 103), I gained no sense whatsoever of how this father related to his son. Every human interaction Ames (Robinson) writes is marked by constraint, weariness and shy civility. The aching lack of intimacy in this novel made every page a grueling ordeal to wade through. “Take action!” I shouted. “Stop writing!”
I’m left to wonder what Robinson feels about her main character. I sense that she adores his humble (though never naïve) faith, and the grace he tries to offer others. But the portrait she paints, or at least the format she has chosen to use, counteracts any message I might derive from the old preacher’s wisdom and experience. By writing the story as a last testament in-progress, Robinson has created an utterly passive character, a true bystander of the life he is narrating. I don’t believe this was her goal. We are clearly supposed to revel in the homely and kindly spiritual reflections of a faithful old coot that is continually surprised by beauty. But for this passive bystander, I felt mostly pity, and quite a bit of anger.
Another perspective, however, is that Robinson has rightly captured the unfortunate experience of so many pastors, especially of Ames’ (and my grandfather’s) generation: that of distance and objectivity. My grandfather once spoke of a minister he served under who believed it was un-Christian for a minister to befriend his congregants because it would cloud his ability to pastor. Can we even imagine a pastor who would not eat supper at a parishioner’s home? Does Ames’ loner quality, his reticence to become entangled, simply reflect the expectations put on a country preacher? This was the time (and the concept persists in some realms) where the pastor was expected to run every aspect of the church. Ames’ statement that everyday felt essentially like Sunday because once one sermon was over, it was already time to work on the next (p. 232-233), reflects the overburdened lifestyle of one who is expected to shepherd whole congregations by sheer determination and will power- with no rest or support system other than other local pastors (Boughton). This symptomatic lone wolf quality made it difficult for me to believe Ames’ speculations on relationships, because I could hear his strained resentment trying to come out. (It finally emerges somewhat in regards to being given a godson without his consent, and over Jack Boughton’s flagrant disrespect for others).
I have not written much of Ames and Jack Boughton, mostly because the character was introduced far too late in the novel to bear the climactic significance it was clearly supposed to have. The real story should have been how Ames chooses to reveal himself and be present with his young son, not his struggle to give grace to his black sheep of a godson. That is indeed significant, but is again, un-served by the journal format of the book. The developing story of Jack Boughton’s struggles have no place in Ames’ letters to his son. Confined by Robinson’s poorly chosen device, the last fourth of the book (despite being the most readable) breaks the rules set in the beginning of Ames writing to his son. Instead, the reader encounters Robinson’s clunky exposition about the life of a character we have not been effectively convinced to care about. Overall, this is my greatest criticism for the novel, both artistically and theologically: it’s nearly impossible to care for these characters when they are introduced as part of an avoidant old man’s journal entry. The richer story to be told here is that of an old man opening his heart through action and engagement with his community, after a long life of loneliness. In order to experience this part of the story, Robinson needed to give us voices other than Ames to listen to. Ames’ emotional distance in interpersonal relationships makes his spiritual and poetic ruminations fall short of the impact Robinson so clearly intended. This novel made my heart ache; wanting the silent men in my life to get up from their journals, and actually say what they’re thinking. And this, perhaps, is too much to require of a novel. Is it too much to require of these old men as well? Isn’t the real point of a last testament the admittance that too much has gone unsaid? Should we celebrate a theology that waits too long to speak?
...less
Read in April, 2007
It often feels as if the contemporary literary scene has internalized Anna Karenina’s dictum on the nature of happiness—that it is not idiosyncratic, with the implication that it is not worth the kind of careful attention that literature applies to its subjects. We need look no further than our own lives to recognize the problem we’ll encounter if we preoccupy ourselves with the Tolstoyan “unhappy family” at the expense of the happy ones. Asked about our defining or most enlight...more
It often feels as if the contemporary literary scene has internalized Anna Karenina’s dictum on the nature of happiness—that it is not idiosyncratic, with the implication that it is not worth the kind of careful attention that literature applies to its subjects. We need look no further than our own lives to recognize the problem we’ll encounter if we preoccupy ourselves with the Tolstoyan “unhappy family” at the expense of the happy ones. Asked about our defining or most enlightening moments, most of us are as likely to recount happy memories as we are moments of despair. Yet too often, contemporary literature ignores this. Authors able to give the lie to Tolstoy by rendering joy as a complex substance are few and far between: think Ron Carlson, Laurie Colwin, Ellen Gilchrist, Richard Russo.
In this context, Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead comes not just as a breath of fresh air, but as a ray of light, quietly penetrating to the heart of mysteries regarding joy and love, life and death. Because it’s written as a series of missives from the aged narrator to his young son, meant not to be read until long after the narrator’s death, Gilead is largely plotless—a conflict of sorts between the narrator and a friend’s child does eventually develop, but it is a quiet conflict, and one that doesn’t become clear until nearly halfway through the novel. The narrative is never as important as the meditations that surround it.
This is a novel that celebrates life, that variegated communion between inner and outer worlds, between ego and experience. But Robinson is also concerned with death, not only as the inevitable end of that communion but also as its thematic counterpoint. If Robinson’s territory here is the spiritual life of one man in particular, her thematic concern is how we in general can face the ends of our lives without despair or resort to existential reframings of the problem—how we can face the prospect of death, in fact, with quiet gratitude and even joy. Robinson’s portrayal of religion is especially deft; instead of opiate or panacea, her narrator’s Christianity serves as a lens, providing a stasis and a vocabulary through which the novel can wrestle with its concerns.
Ultimately, the quiet conclusions that Gilead seems to favor—that the experience of existence is one that we should treasure as a gift, that we too often lose sight of the immense beauty of the world amidst our quotidian bustle, that love and charity have the power to remake lives—are neither religious nor secular. Rather, they are humanist; they all concern a belief in the fundamental dignity of human lives. Is it melodramatic to say that these are the kind of quiet encouragements that we could usefully carry in our minds into the shadows of our own personal Gethsemanes? Regardless, Gilead offers us, in its portrait of a long life reflected upon with some degree of contentment, a reminder of just how deep, enthralling, and abidingly strange happiness can be.
Perhaps the problem is not that happiness is not idiosyncratic enough to be worth investigating. The problem may be instead that happiness is simply too big for most writers to write convincingly about, that perhaps joy, like God, is too capacious to fully describe. Yet here is the rare novel that suggests insights into the natures of both....less
bookshelves:
as-i-lay-dying,
carpe-diem,
fiction
Read in March, 2008
This was a really gorgeous book. It takes the form of a letter written by John Ames, an elderly preacher who knows that he is dying, to his young son so that his son will have some sense of who he is and what he was like when he was alive. The letter becomes a sort of love letter to life in general and to his own life specifically and a way for him to meditate upon and affirm his own worth in order to ready himself to leave the world and the life and family that he adores.
It is written in th...more
This was a really gorgeous book. It takes the form of a letter written by John Ames, an elderly preacher who knows that he is dying, to his young son so that his son will have some sense of who he is and what he was like when he was alive. The letter becomes a sort of love letter to life in general and to his own life specifically and a way for him to meditate upon and affirm his own worth in order to ready himself to leave the world and the life and family that he adores.
It is written in this very slow and contemplative way that has a hypnotic, gentle beauty. It is filled with very thoughtful meditations on scripture and the nature of life and humanity and I found myself re-reading passages several times to grasp the complex thoughts that lay beneath the simple language. But I never felt that the book was pretentious or preachy, just thoughtful and lifted up by the wisdom and experience of a long life lived well and cherished.
As a mother with a young son of my own, I was particularly touched by the passages that described the achingly powerful love that Reverend Ames has for his son:
"I'd never have believed I'd see a wife of mine doting on a son of mine. It still amazes me every time I think of it. I'm writing this in part to tell you that if you ever wonder what you've done in your life, and everyone does wonder sooner or later, you have been God's grace to me, a miracle, something more than a miracle. You may not remember me very well at all, and it may seem to you to be no great thing to have been the good child of an old man in a shabby little town you will no doubt leave behind. If only I had the words to tell you."
or:
"Sometimes now when you crawl into my lap and settle against me and I feel that light, quick strength or your body and the weightiness of your head, when you're cold from playing in the sprinkler or warm from your bath at night, and you lie in my arms and fiddle with my beard and tell me what you've been thinking about, that is perfectly pleasant, and I imagine your child self finding me in heaven and jumping into my arms, and there is great joy in that thought."
The author is able to vividly capture a parent's love, a love so tremendous that it leaves you alone and vulnerable, and a love so momentous that it reintroduces you to the world and to life through every little step that your child takes.
She also delves simply and poignantly into the frequent difficulty of relationships between parents and their adult children, especially those who feel elusive to the parents. A Presbytarian minister in the same town, who is John Ames closest friend and who is also aged and ailing, has a "prodigal son" who remains his biggest mysterious failing:
"And old Boughton, if he could stand up out of his chair, out of his decrepitude and crankiness and sorrow and limitation, would abandon all of those handsome children of his, mild and confident as they are, and follow after that one son whom he has never known, whom he has favored as one does a wound."
This is the sort of book that is filled with passages that are jewel-like in their clarity, and I suppose that I could go on quoting it eternally. It truly seems to have an insight into life and the difficult beauty of what it is to live. I am not at all a religious person, but I was truly touched by the significance that Rev. Ames's faith lent to the smallest experiences in his life. I recommend this book to anyone who feels like looking at the little things with a greater respect and sense of wonder.
...less
bookshelves:
fiction
Read in September, 2005
What a luxury, what a fine wine on the literary palate this book has been to read. "Gilead" by Marilyn Robinson is all that I seek in literature that achieves artistic form. The author's language is mesmerizing, frequently breathtaking, and her ability to develop her few but well chosen characters without relying on plot and action as crutch is worthy of respect.
"Gilead" is something of a journal, or letter, written by an elderly priest, John Ames, to his still very youn...more
What a luxury, what a fine wine on the literary palate this book has been to read. "Gilead" by Marilyn Robinson is all that I seek in literature that achieves artistic form. The author's language is mesmerizing, frequently breathtaking, and her ability to develop her few but well chosen characters without relying on plot and action as crutch is worthy of respect.
"Gilead" is something of a journal, or letter, written by an elderly priest, John Ames, to his still very young son as he feels the approach of death. It is his attempt to pass something of himself and their family history on to his son, long after he will be gone. His story is a meditation on faith and the bonds of father and son, of husband and wife, of family and friends, of priest and his congregation, of man and nature. It is not, however, a religious story (those who are not drawn to Christian literature need not fear this novel might wax preachy or hit a didactic note -- it does not).
I was magnetically drawn to the character of John Ames because Robinson so ably created him as a man with the greatest courage possible -- the courage to be vulnerable to the world around him. He has achieved grace, because we see him address his own shortcomings and weaknesses without looking away. He works to love, even those he on some level fears, even when he feels tinges of jealousy, regret, suspicion, as any man might.
"This morning I have been trying to think about heaven, but without much success. I don't know why I should expect to have any idea of heaven. I could never have imagined this world if I hadn't spent almost eight decades walking around in it. People talk about how wonderful the world seems to children, and that's true enough. But children think they will grow into it and understand it, and I know very well that I will not, and would not, and would not if I had a dozen lives. That's clearer to me every day. Each morning I'm like Adam waking up in Eden, amazed at the cleverness of my hands and at the brilliance pouring into my mind through my eyes--old hands, old eyes, old mind, a very diminished Adam altogether, and still it is just remarkable..." (page 67)
Ames is filled with gratitude for all that his simple life has bestowed on him: the love of a devoted wife, the adoration of a young son, the warranted attention of a congregation, but just as fully, for the beauty of each day gifted to him.
"I love the prairie! So often I have seen the dawn come and the light flood over the land and everything turn radiant at once, that word 'good' so profoundly affirmed in my soul that I am amazed I should be allowed to witness such a thing. There may have been a more wonderful first moment 'when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy,' but for all I know the contrary, they still do sing and shout, and they certainly might well. Here on the prairie there is nothing to distract attention from the evening and the morning, nothing on the horizon to abbreviate or to delay. Mountains would seem an impertinence from that point of view..." (page 246)
Perhaps one must be facing one's own death to see life and the world so richly, and to express it with such eloquence and love. Readers may feel blessed to have found an author who accomplishes this level of eloquence. The Pulitzer Prize awarded this work of literary art is well deserved.
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bookshelves:
non-victorianfiction,
philosophyspirituality,
read-2007
Read in December, 2007
recommended to Inder by:
Elizabeth
recommends it for:
Serious, thoughtful, passionate folks.
I've been thinking and thinking about this book, so I find myself coming back to this review.
The basic plot (such as it is - this is a character driven book in the most basic sense): An old preacher finds out that he is dying, and writes a journal/memoir to his seven year old son.
There are a couple of breathtaking scenes in the book, that have stuck with me. The narrator remembers a time in his childhood, in the late 19th century, when the local church burned down. The community came ou...more
I've been thinking and thinking about this book, so I find myself coming back to this review.
The basic plot (such as it is - this is a character driven book in the most basic sense): An old preacher finds out that he is dying, and writes a journal/memoir to his seven year old son.
There are a couple of breathtaking scenes in the book, that have stuck with me. The narrator remembers a time in his childhood, in the late 19th century, when the local church burned down. The community came out in force to clean up the wreckage and salvage what could be salvaged. The women sang hymns while they worked. It began to rain, and the girl's skirts were dirty and wet, and their hair hung down their backs. His father offered him bread from his hands, covered in ash and soot. To the narrator, this was the most important "communion" of his life. The image comes up over and over again, and the theme is repeated when the narrator gives his son communion in his own church many years later (although he is too young to formally take communion). I thought it was so beautiful, the essence of what communion should be about.
Which brings me to another thing I loved about the book: The strong sense of generations, the passing of love and knowledge and problems from father to son through the generations. As my friend Elizabeth says, the book lingers long on issues of masculinity. I related so strongly to the characters that I didn't even really notice that until it was pointed out to me! But it's true, this is a book about how to be a righteous man (in the best, least judgmental meaning of "righteous"), and how to grow your sons into righteous men.
I also loved the very last scene. I don't want to spoil it, but it is so beautiful. This is one of those rare novels where the end does not disappoint.
And, of course, there's the rhythm of the narration, and the language. So slow, lilting, sad, and lovely, like one of the slower Sacred Harp hymns I love to sing. It's almost Homeric, in the sense that it feels like oral history, with the rhythm of very old-fashioned storytelling.
Reading around on Goodreads, this is apparently something many readers found difficult and criticize on their reviews. I can see that it's an acquired taste.
I loved it, but I read older novels all the time, constantly seeking out that softer, slower, more detailed rhythm of writing that seemed more common pre-TV. If your obsessions tend more towards the cyber-punk post-modern, this book might seem too heavy and slow - in fact, it has almost no plot at all, which might throw some people off.
But of course, the adoption of an older style is, in itself, a bit interesting and pastiche-y. But now I'm out of my comfort zone - I'll let someone else deconstruct it.
Meanwhile, I highly recommend this book to all of my serious, thoughtful, passionate friends who like serious, thoughtful, passionate books....less
bookshelves:
literary-fiction
Great book. A 76 year-old minister finds out he's dying and he writes a letter to his 7 year-old son. The whole book is a letter. Sounds kind of dull, but it's not. He tells all about his family in Kansas and Iowa, incorporating history and religion into the tale. The writing is so beautiful it's like poetry. And it's all just this old guy's thoughts. He has a lot to say, if you can dig it. Some of my favorite bits:
p.6
"Above all mind what you say. 'Behold how much wood is kindled by h...more
Great book. A 76 year-old minister finds out he's dying and he writes a letter to his 7 year-old son. The whole book is a letter. Sounds kind of dull, but it's not. He tells all about his family in Kansas and Iowa, incorporating history and religion into the tale. The writing is so beautiful it's like poetry. And it's all just this old guy's thoughts. He has a lot to say, if you can dig it. Some of my favorite bits:
p.6
"Above all mind what you say. 'Behold how much wood is kindled by how small a fire, and the tongue is a fire.'--that's the truth."
p.203
"...a sheet of water came sailing toward us, billowing in the air like a veil, and fell down over us.[...]it seems to me transformations just that abrupt do occur in this life, and they beggar your hopes and your deserving."
p.204
"...the terrible pleasure we find in a particular face can certainly instruct us in the nature of the very grandest love."
p.204-5
"nothing had prepared me to find myself thinking day and night about a complete stranger, a woman much too young, probably a married woman--that was the first time in my life I ever felt I could be snatched out of my character, my calling, my reputation, as if they could just fall away like a dry husk."
p.205-6
"I felt everyone in the room knew I was standing there making a confession of my folly. It seemed inevitable to me that she would never come back again. So I spent a dreadful week resigning myself to the smallness of my life, the drabness of it, and thanking the Lord that I had never made a complete fool of myself[...] And I spent the week missing her as if she were the only friend I had ever had on earth."
p.207
"...I began to give thanks that I had lived through the worst of my passion without making a ruin and a desolation of my good name, without running after her in the street, as I nearly did once when I saw her step out of the grocery store and walk away."
p.208
"If you want to inform yourselves as to the nature of hell, don't hold your hand in a candle flame, just ponder the meanest, most desolate place in your soul."
They all did ponder a good while, and I did, too, listening to the evening wind and the cicadas. I came near alarming myself with the thought of the loneliness stretching ahead of me, and the new bitterness of it, and how I hated the secretiveness and the renunciation that honor and decency required of me and that common sense enforced on me."
p.238
"There is no justice in love, no proportion in it, and there need not be, because in any specific instance it is only a glimpse or parable of an embracing, incomprehensible reality. It makes no sense at all because it is the eternal breaking in on the temporal. So how could it subordinate itself to cause or consequence?"
p.243
"There are a thousand thousand reasons to live this life, every one of them sufficient."...less
I just finished this book, I read it because someone way back when told me it was good and way back when every time I tried to get it at the library it was gone. So when I saw it on the shelf during my most recent stop at Farmingdale Public Library I picked it up and thought, well...why not.
The basic idea of the book is this old preacher married this young woman late in life and they have a son. Then the preacher is told he is going to die and starts writing a letter to his son trying to te...more
I just finished this book, I read it because someone way back when told me it was good and way back when every time I tried to get it at the library it was gone. So when I saw it on the shelf during my most recent stop at Farmingdale Public Library I picked it up and thought, well...why not.
The basic idea of the book is this old preacher married this young woman late in life and they have a son. Then the preacher is told he is going to die and starts writing a letter to his son trying to tell him all the things he wants him to know about that he will not have time to tell him. And the whole book is the letter.
As I was reading some parts felt exactly like an old man rambling on, which I guess could be the point but some of it didn’t feel like it was moving anything along. I don't care that the cat is yet again watching the son play in the yard. But other times I felt like the preacher had such wonderful insight into what is important. But I think the parts that I enjoyed the most involved the struggle of this old man deciding if he should tell the shameful secret of a friend. I enjoyed the struggle. I know that sounds mean, but this guy is not real so I am aloud to enjoy his struggle.
The struggle was enjoyable because it felt real. It felt like something we all do. We all have to decide what truths we share and which we keep to ourselves, whether they are our own truths or someone else’s. Good truths or bad truths. And most the time we can not guess what sharing the truth will do to others or what keeping that truth will do to us, so we must decide. And this man’s decision process was right there, the back and forth that is involved in all important decisions was right there and it was refreshing to watch that unfold.
Well now that I have gone on way too long I’ll say that I liked the book. It wasn’t the biggest page turner I’ve ever read but it was good and while I will probably not read it again any time soon I wouldn’t tell anyone not to read it and I might recommend it some people.
Oh, one last thing. The book has no real chapter divisions and that sorta drove me crazy.
...less
Every time I went into a bookstore I would see this book and mentally put it on my to-read list. I finally received it as a gift and was very eager to begin reading the story of John Ames ( an old pastor who was writing a letter to his young son because he was dying). I thought it would be artfully told with moments of great poignancy and deep fatherly and spiritual advice. I was greatly disappointed.
The first half of book jumps around from the story of John Ames' grandfather and father...more
Every time I went into a bookstore I would see this book and mentally put it on my to-read list. I finally received it as a gift and was very eager to begin reading the story of John Ames ( an old pastor who was writing a letter to his young son because he was dying). I thought it would be artfully told with moments of great poignancy and deep fatherly and spiritual advice. I was greatly disappointed.
The first half of book jumps around from the story of John Ames' grandfather and father, both of whom were also pastors, and it shares with us how John Ames became a father and husband at such a late age. It is not coherent and is very disjointed. It is written like a man who writes a little every day of what he remembers on that given day with no thought to the reader. There isn't much in the way of sage advice or lessons learned from a man who should have seen and learned a lot. I during the first part of the book there were numerous times I had to put it down and then force myself to finish, hoping it would get better.
The second half of the book introduces a man also by the name John Ames, this man is the son of his best friend. Jack, as the namesake is usually called, is a prodigal son. He has been away from quite awhile and has a bit of a past. At this point the letter seems to be a way for him to try and acclimate himself to the idea that this man may take his place once he dies. He discusses the bad character of Jack and then tries to reconcile that with the fact he is his namesake and son of his best friend. The book ends with a us learning something about Jack that may change our minds about him and the type of man he is; it changes the way John Ames views him. Then the book gives a couple more small thoughts and it stops. It left me feeling completely unfulfilled and wanting more and at the same wanting to never ever pick it up again. It was tedious, long even though it is only 246 pages, pedistrian, and not at all what it promised to be. ...less
Read in May, 2007
I really loved this book. One of my favorite parts reminds me of a scene in Willa Cather's My Antonia . There is this lovely image when John Ames is a child and he and his father are at his grandfather's grave. They found the grave out on the prairie somewhere near a place the grandfather had been ministering. John's father is saying a prayer before they say their final goodbyes, as the grave is nowhere near where the family lives:
"... At first I thought I saw the sun setting in...more
I really loved this book. One of my favorite parts reminds me of a scene in Willa Cather's My Antonia . There is this lovely image when John Ames is a child and he and his father are at his grandfather's grave. They found the grave out on the prairie somewhere near a place the grandfather had been ministering. John's father is saying a prayer before they say their final goodbyes, as the grave is nowhere near where the family lives:
"... At first I thought I saw the sun setting in the east; I knew where east was, because the sun was just over the horizon when we got there that morning. Then I realized that what I saw was a full moon rising just as the sun was going down. Each of them was standing on its edge, with the most wonderful light between them. It seemed as if you could touch it, as if there were palpable currents of light passing back and forth, or as if there were great taut skeins of light suspended between them. I wanted my father to see it, but I knew I'd have to startle him out of his prayer, and I wanted to do it the best way, so I took his hand and kissed it. And then I said, "Look at the moon," And he did. We just stood there until the sun was down and the moon was up. They seemed to float on the horizon for quite a long time, I suppose because they were both so bright you couldn't get a clear look at them. And the grave, and my father and I, were exactly between them, which seemed amazing to me at the time, since I hadn't given much thought to the nature of the horizon.
My father said," I would never have thought this place could be beautiful. I'm glad to know that."
This little scene was so evocative I just had to put the book down and sigh. There were many points as I was reading this book that made me feel that way. It was just wonderful....less
Read in April, 2008
recommended to Giedra by:
Carrie Neal
My book club read this book right before I joined the club. Most of the members hated it, and at many subsequent book club discussions, books were compared to Gilead as, "well, at least it was easier to read than Gilead, etc." After several months of hearing about this book, I decided I needed to read this book for myself. (Perhaps to get more insight into my fellow book club members!)
Well, I liked the book a LOT. I was very surprised to find that it's a pretty slim book--from ...more
My book club read this book right before I joined the club. Most of the members hated it, and at many subsequent book club discussions, books were compared to Gilead as, "well, at least it was easier to read than Gilead, etc." After several months of hearing about this book, I decided I needed to read this book for myself. (Perhaps to get more insight into my fellow book club members!)
Well, I liked the book a LOT. I was very surprised to find that it's a pretty slim book--from the way my friends talked about it, I had assumed it was 800 pages of turgid prose. But it wasn't at all! It was written in the form of a journal of an older man who knows he will die before his young son reaches adulthood and wants to record some of the interesting things about their family and his accumulated wisdom for his son. I can see how some areas of the book were initially confusing, as the narrator is sometimes repetitive, and not always clear on who he's referring to (for example, he talks about his father and grandfather, who are both ministers, as he is, and it's hard to keep the different ministers straight when none of them get names--and then add on to that occasionally he might refer to his father as "your grandfather"!). But overall, I didn't find it hard to read at all, and I loved so many of things that the narrator said that I wanted to write them down. And given the device, I thought it was only appropriate that the narrator might be repetitive or vague, as this would be true also of a real-life handwritten journal.
I would recommend to anyone who enjoys reading a wide variety of genres. It's not a "story" in the traditional sense, but there was enough plot--wondering whether he would live long enough to finish telling about one particular relationship in his life---and particularly enough interesting insights gleaned from his long life in Kansas to keep me interested the whole way through. In my view, deserving of its Pulitzer Prize!!
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Read in December, 2007
"grace is not so poor a thing that it cannot present itself in any number of ways", a beautiful quote from the reverend John Ames, the Father who, at the end of his life, writes this extensive letter/journal to his son. This book is beautiful, showing how grace comes to us in an endless number of forms, shapes, faces, people, words, circumstances, trials, and depth. I feel that I only grasped an iota of grace contained in this book, and that I need to read it several more times to rea...more
"grace is not so poor a thing that it cannot present itself in any number of ways", a beautiful quote from the reverend John Ames, the Father who, at the end of his life, writes this extensive letter/journal to his son. This book is beautiful, showing how grace comes to us in an endless number of forms, shapes, faces, people, words, circumstances, trials, and depth. I feel that I only grasped an iota of grace contained in this book, and that I need to read it several more times to really see the brilliance and depth Gilead possesses. Here are a few more of my favorite quotes from Gilead:
"That's the strangest thing about this life, about being in the ministry. People change the subject when they see you coming. And then sometimes those very same people come into your study and tell you the most remarkable things. There's a lot under the surface of life, everyone knows that. A lot of malice and dread and guilt, and so much loneliness, where you wouldn't really expect to find it, either"
"You can know a thing to death and be for all purposes completely ignorant of it. A man can know his father, or his son, and there might still be nothing between them but loyalty and love and mutual incomprehension"
"Well, but how deeply I regret any sadness you have suffered and how grateful I am in anticipation of any good you have enjoyed. That is to say, I pray for you. And there's an intimacy in it. That's the truth"
"It has seemed to me sometimes as though the Lord breathes on this poor gray ember of Creation and it turns to radiance -- for a moment or a year or the span of a life. And then it sinks back into itself again, and to look at it no one would know it had anything to do with fire, or light"
"Wherever you turn your eyes the world can shine like transfiguration. You don't have to bring a thing to it except a willingness to see. Only, who could have the courage to see it?"
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Read in January, 2006
I loved this unique, deep, and warm book. It is written as if by an older pastor in the 50s who would like to write his “memoirs” for his young son, as he knows he is going to die soon. He lives in and is very connected to the small town Gilead. The female author does an excellent job of taking on the perspective of this older pastor who is about to die (John Ames), eloquently writes, but also convinces you that it you are reading a person’s intimate and sometimes random thoughts. The ...more
I loved this unique, deep, and warm book. It is written as if by an older pastor in the 50s who would like to write his “memoirs” for his young son, as he knows he is going to die soon. He lives in and is very connected to the small town Gilead. The female author does an excellent job of taking on the perspective of this older pastor who is about to die (John Ames), eloquently writes, but also convinces you that it you are reading a person’s intimate and sometimes random thoughts. The first half of the book is a little tedious to get into, as there is no plot. However, it does lay the history down of previous relationships with fathers/sons in his life. The book comes alive when Boughton, his good friend’s son, comes to town and begins to spend time with John’s family. You begin to see John’s faults/struggles come through, making your view of him more human and intimate. He begins to struggle with his death/leaving, becomes jealous over John, and worries about his family being cared for (and trusting God). He begins to hang onto the church, his family, and the town. Unfortunately, you see the change in him (losing sleep and peace) as he genuinely struggles with this and you begin to see how complicated his relationship with John Boughton is. I believe John became jealous/bitter over John B. right when he was born and named after him (as his “other son”) due to John’s loss of his first child. It was almost as if he could not take his best friend having what he had lost and these feelings of jealousy became a type of loathing towards John B. I love this man’s character, his love for his wife, his love for God, and his thinking on difficult topics (which, in turn, makes you think). I love the idea that his son will read this and get a beautiful and honest sense of who his father is.
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Read in October, 2007
recommends it for:
heathens
This book is amazing. I can't believe those frikkin twits didn't give Marilynne Robinson the Pulitzer for this..... oh wait, they did. Well, I can't believe they didn't give her two!
Seriously, you are probably thinking, "I've heard this book takes the form of an elderly, angina-stricken preacher in Iowa's long, Lord-laden letter to his young son about how beautiful the world is. I'm sure it's all very nice for some people, but I am way too big of a jerk to enjoy something like that.&quo...more
This book is amazing. I can't believe those frikkin twits didn't give Marilynne Robinson the Pulitzer for this..... oh wait, they did. Well, I can't believe they didn't give her two!
Seriously, you are probably thinking, "I've heard this book takes the form of an elderly, angina-stricken preacher in Iowa's long, Lord-laden letter to his young son about how beautiful the world is. I'm sure it's all very nice for some people, but I am way too big of a jerk to enjoy something like that."
Well, let me tell you something, friend: I am a pretty big jerk myself, and I loved it. This is one of the better books I have read. If this novel doesn't make you weep at some point, there is probably something seriously wrong with you.
I'll admit that, like *Valley of the Dolls*, this book is probably not for everyone. But I really do recommend it to people who (like me) are not religious, and find others' faith difficult to understand. If you're able to respond empathically to characters in extremely well-written literature, this might be the best chance you get at entering this kind of experience. That was the way I felt about it, anyway. You only need to suspend some judgment you hold about religion, and take the protagonist's faith the way you would another belief or experience a fictional character might have that's diffferent from your own. I don't want to get carried away characterizing what the result of that was like for me, but I do recommend giving this book a try.
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Read in June, 2007
recommends it for:
Folks Interested in Religion & Redemption
Craddled within the world of Marilynne Robinson's Gilead, there's a quiet yearning, a desire inherently expressed within the novel's structure to slow down, to walk lightly, to observe without participation. In its reflections on religion and moral goodness, its story is undemanding, thoughtful and filled with a sense a peace, the kind found only when spiritual worries fade to divine acceptance.
Through the eyes John Ames, a Methodist preacher coming to terms with his immenient death,...more
Craddled within the world of Marilynne Robinson's Gilead, there's a quiet yearning, a desire inherently expressed within the novel's structure to slow down, to walk lightly, to observe without participation. In its reflections on religion and moral goodness, its story is undemanding, thoughtful and filled with a sense a peace, the kind found only when spiritual worries fade to divine acceptance.
Through the eyes John Ames, a Methodist preacher coming to terms with his immenient death, the landscape of Gilead, Iowa is painted as one provincial, its hope held on my a thread, its purpose increasingly depleted and rendered irrelevant with its failures to garner true redemption. Structured as a letter written to Ames' young son, a "begat" of sorts Robinson writes, the story weaves into the worlds Ames has neglected: those about his atheist brother, his wanton godson, his eccentric, abolitionist grandfather. The retelling of their stories runs circular, almost a bit repetitive, in a pattern of confession, deviation and then return to confession. Yet, the patterning is not obvious in the read, nor is it distracting. In fact, it's often welcome, as if for a few seconds the reader follows the narrator's stream of consciousness in true thinking, of the connectivity and spontaneity of thoughts' juxtapositions.
Quietly though not forcefully, the book lays it's hands on the reader, studying universal ideas about God and humanity. Yet, it's a book so tame in its manner that it's a bit forgettable, its images etheral, like its religious content, a mystery to memory.
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Read in January, 2007
The Pulitzer-winner from 2004. The book is told from the first-person narrative of John Ames, a 76-year-old minister from Gilead, Iowa, and traces bits and pieces of his life – his relationship with his father and grandfather (an anti-slavery preacher during the 1800s who fought alongside John Brown); his relationship with his friend and fellow-preacher Rev. Boughton and Boughton’s wayward son (named after John Ames); and especially his son and his much-younger wife (younger by 30+ years). ...more
The Pulitzer-winner from 2004. The book is told from the first-person narrative of John Ames, a 76-year-old minister from Gilead, Iowa, and traces bits and pieces of his life – his relationship with his father and grandfather (an anti-slavery preacher during the 1800s who fought alongside John Brown); his relationship with his friend and fellow-preacher Rev. Boughton and Boughton’s wayward son (named after John Ames); and especially his son and his much-younger wife (younger by 30+ years). John Ames has a bad ticker, and so the narrative is related in the form of a long letter to his 7-year-old son whom he’ll miss when he passes away. Gilead has stunningly beautiful prose that is quietly profound. The voice of John Ames is unique and well-formed; it sounds genuinely like a wistful old man writing to his beloved son. There is an underlying current of melancholy as John ponders his impending mortality, but that melancholy is uplifted by a celebration of the beauty of life and existence and the wonderfulness of being. Robinson explores racism and faith and love and sadness and joy and every other emotion available to a man relating his views on life and death, and she does this exploration through meandering prose with clarity that makes your heart ache. There is a hymn and a religious phrase (“balm of Gilead”) that I am certain this book was named after, and the significance of healing, restoration, and salvation (which is what the phrase refers to) is woven throughout this novel. Gilead is one of my top books of 2007 for its emotional resonance....less
recommends it for:
you
I just finished reading it this morning. I cried at its end, not for its end, nor because it was sad. It was beautiful. I sat there on the toilet reading until my legs were asleep to finish, a ridiculous place to experience beauty that would make one weep.
The book is no master piece of poetry, no epic, not the brash offspring of sharp wit or forceful essay of vast intellect. I would not call the story or its players particularly memorable. No surprising twists. No strange quirks. No gimmicks...more
I just finished reading it this morning. I cried at its end, not for its end, nor because it was sad. It was beautiful. I sat there on the toilet reading until my legs were asleep to finish, a ridiculous place to experience beauty that would make one weep.
The book is no master piece of poetry, no epic, not the brash offspring of sharp wit or forceful essay of vast intellect. I would not call the story or its players particularly memorable. No surprising twists. No strange quirks. No gimmicks. No cliffhangers or breathtakers. The landscape is plain, with residents to match. The story moves slow, even sluggishly along. If anything in it is foreign or new to me, it is the age of John Ames. But that, too, is not unusual, only outside my experience to date.
There is no escapism or novelty to grab interest in this novel. I can think of little to recommend it to you, except perhaps to say that it moves me. Its town is blessed in the end by the old man, "To me it seems rather Christlike to be as unadorned as this place is, as little regarded." As the town is to him, the like-named book is to me, a clear yet gentle echo of real beauty, humble enough to be thoroughly human. The very bones of it are composed of grace, the muscle faith, the skin a little regarded, dying man.
If you read it, do not be afraid to take a long time and let it sink in slowly. As one reviewer on the back of this library copy says, it is "a book to be savored." It is rich food, best not gulped down in a hurry....less
This book is nothing less than miraculous, in my estimation.
In Oliver Stone's documentary, "Like a Rolling Stone: Bob Dylan at the Crossroads," someone who's interviewed talks about how Dylan, in the sixties was like this almost unintentional conductor of the cultural ethos of the time. I can't summarize it properly without seeing the movie again (which I will, and so, I'll update this later), but the idea was that Dylan was almost a lightning rod for the beat of the times, and he...more
This book is nothing less than miraculous, in my estimation.
In Oliver Stone's documentary, "Like a Rolling Stone: Bob Dylan at the Crossroads," someone who's interviewed talks about how Dylan, in the sixties was like this almost unintentional conductor of the cultural ethos of the time. I can't summarize it properly without seeing the movie again (which I will, and so, I'll update this later), but the idea was that Dylan was almost a lightning rod for the beat of the times, and he seemed to have the message of the era just flow through him, even unwittingly at times.
That's how I feel about Marilynne Robinson's book, "Gilead." To me, it is so pitch perfect that I feel she must have been guided by some higher form or divinity, truly inspired in her writing. It's like how Milton was able to create a perfect form and message in "Paradise Lost," despite being blind and incapable of ready re-writing, or Michelangelo's Sistene Chapel... No mere human could create such fine work without divine guidance.
Gilead is filled with tiny, profound truths that are sprinkled along in commonsense language and is worthy of multiple re-reads. I believe that this is a book I will return to throughout my life and always find something new - in part because there is so much to absorb, and in part because each time I will re-approach it, I will be a different person, in a sense, with new life experiences to ponder and reflect upon as I pass through Gilead again. ...les 
