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Hannah Coulter

by Wendell Berry

4.19 · rating details · 1,144 ratings · 316 reviews

"Ignorant boys, killing each other," is just about all Nathan Coulter would tell his wife, friends, and family about the Battle of Okinawa in the spring of 1945. Life carried on for the community of Port William, Kentucky, as some boys returned from the war and the lives of others were mourned. In her seventies, Nathan's wife, Hannah, has time now to tell of the ...more

Paperback, 190 pages

Published September 30th 2005 by Shoemaker & Hoard (first published 2004)

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Community Reviews

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Jan 17, 2009

Brooke rated it

Such an insightful book. The sentimental in me really was affected by Hannah's memories and observations of the changing times. It definitely increased my longing to be a part of a community (a "membership", if you will). Anyone want to be a part of my community? We'll all move out to the country and live within walking distance of each other, our kids will grow up together, and we'll experience life's joys and sorrows together. Seriously, when I read books like this, I realize jus...more

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Mar 21, 2008

James rated it

My grandmother wanted me to read this and I understood immediately why. Though she grew up in Missouri rather than the Kentucky side of the Ohio River where this novel takes place, the elements are similar to her experiences. This is an episodic novel that doesn't spend so much time telling a story per se but rather sets a scene and places the characters within it. Very readable, marvelous imagery, plain speaking in its descriptions and the characters have a subtle depth. This is my first We...more

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Feb 25, 2009

Callie rated it

Wow. This book is a gift. I first heard about Wendell Berry in college when we were studying nature writers and I think we read some of his poetry. But I haven't really thought of him since then, yet I am so glad I picked this up. I loved this novel. It's about a small farming community and covers the life of one woman in that community. The way people are in this book and their values feel so familiar to me, and I don't find many books like that. And although there is much about this that feels...moreWow. This book is a gift. I first heard about Wendell Berry in college when we were studying nature writers and I think we read some of his poetry. But I haven't really thought of him since then, yet I am so glad I picked this up. I loved this novel. It's about a small farming community and covers the life of one woman in that community. The way people are in this book and their values feel so familiar to me, and I don't find many books like that. And although there is much about this that feels old fashioned and familiar, there's something revolutionary about it too. Made me feel the way I felt the first time I read Thoreau, reminding me to question my assumptions and to really ask myself who I am, what it is that I want for my life, and not to be afraid to march to the beat of a different drummer. I just don't find books like this everyday, something with so much wisdom. A lot of reviews I read call Wendell Berry a prophet and I can see why, having read this, he's almost in a class of his own. And, after reading a lot of post modern stuff, which sometimes seems empty, he makes me feel like there is still hope. Now more than ever I need to read books that give me hope. I have to put in some quotes from the book about married love that made me weep (literally) for their profound beauty and truth.

"Watching him and watching myself in my memory now, I know again what I knew before, but now I know more than that. Now I know what we were trying to stand for, and what I believe we did stand for: the possibility that among the world's wars and sufferings two people could love each other for a long time, until death and beyond, and could make a place for each other that would be a part of their love, as their love for each other would be a way of loving their place. This love would be one of the acts of the greater love that holds and cherishes all the world."

"We were looking at each other, though we could barely see. It was almost dark. But to know you love somebody, and to feel his desire falling over you like a warm rain, touching you everywhere, is to have a kind of light. When a woman and a man give themselves to each other, they have a light between them that nobody but them can see. It doesn't shine outward into time. They see only each other and what is between them."

"What I was always reaching toward in him was his gentleness that had been made in him by loss and grief and suffering, a gentleness opposite to the war that he wasn't going to talk about, and never did, but that I know at least something about, having learned it since he died.
The gentleness I knew in him seemed to be calling out, and it was a gentleness in me that answered. That gentleness, calling and answering, giving and taking, brought us together. It brought us into the room of love. It made our place clear around us."

"The rhymes came. But you may have a long journey to travel to meet somebody in the innermost inwardness and sweetness of that room. You can't get there just by wanting to, or just because the night falls. The meeting is prepared in the long day, in the work of years, in the keeping of faith, in kindness.
The room of love is another world. You go there wearing no watch, watching no clock. It is the world without end, so small that two people can hold it in their arms, and yet it is bigger than worlds on worlds, for it contains the longing of all things to be together, and to be at rest together. You come together to the day's end, weary and sore, troubled and afraid. You take it all into your arms, it goes away, and there you are where giving and taking are the same, and you live a little while entirely in a gift. The words have all been said, all permissions given, and you are free in the place that is the two of you together. What could be more heavenly than to have desire and satisfaction in the same room?"

ON MEDITATION:

"I sit and let the quiet come to me. It doesn't come right away. I have to quiet myself before I can hear the quiet of the place, and a car passing along the road up on the hillside or an airplane flying over makes it harder. But I listen and wait, and at last it comes. It is an old quiet, only deepened by the sound of the creek, a bird singing, or a barking squirrel. It goes back to the beginning..."
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Dec 25, 2008

Mark rated it

Shelves: fiction

I think that this calls to mind a word to describe Mr. Berry's writing. That word is reverence. This is the story of a woman born in Shagbark who then moves to Port William and becomes part of the "membership". It tells the story of her love for a man who died too young and of her subsequent life with a second husband who "went right on". The reverence is for the land and what it can produce when tended with loving hands. It is for the people who through the love they have fo...more

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Apr 29, 2008

Holli rated it

Shelves: literary-fiction

What can I say? It’s Wendell Berry. I especially liked his image of the room of love, as quoted below and as described in the chapter. Maybe her life didn’t turn out quite as she would have wanted, with her children all so far away and her way of life passing out of existence, but that image of the room of love speaks of hope, reconciliation, and shalom.--HR

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. "This is the story of my life, that while I lived it weighed upon me a...more What can I say? It’s Wendell Berry. I especially liked his image of the room of love, as quoted below and as described in the chapter. Maybe her life didn’t turn out quite as she would have wanted, with her children all so far away and her way of life passing out of existence, but that image of the room of love speaks of hope, reconciliation, and shalom.--HR

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. "This is the story of my life, that while I lived it weighed upon me and pressed against me and filled all my senses to overflowing and now is like a dream dreamed.... This is my story, my giving of thanks." So begin the reflections of Hannah Coulter, the twice-widowed protagonist of this slim, incandescent novel in Berry's Port William series. In 1940, the precocious, innocent Hannah leaves her small Kentucky farming town to work as a secretary in nearby Hargrave, where she meets Virgil Feltner, seven years her senior, who gently courts her. They marry and have a daughter, but Virgil, "called to the army in 1942," dies in the Battle of the Bulge. Love follows mourning, as a kind but driven farmer, Nathan Coulter, returns from combat and woos Hannah. In delicate, shimmering prose, Berry tracks Hannah's loves and losses through the novel's first half; the narrative sharpens as Hannah recounts her children's lives—Margaret becomes a schoolteacher with a troubled son; Mattie ("a little too eager to climb Fool's Hill") flees rural life to become a globe-trotting communication executive; Caleb, Nathan's hope to run the family farm, becomes a professor of agriculture instead. Beneath the story of ordinary lives lies the work of an extraordinarily wise novelist: as Hannah relates her children's fate to her own deeply rooted rural background, she weaves landscape and family and history together ("My mind... is close to being the room of love where the absent are present, the dead are alive, time is eternal and all creatures prosperous"). Her compassion enlivens every page of this small, graceful novel.

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Mar 29, 2010

Jennifer rated it

I really loved this book. It made me think and it made me feel, which is the mark of a good book. Two things that kept it from getting a five-star rating:

Mr. Berry seemed to go on and on about their property...over and over again, until I grew a little bored in the middle part of the book.

Also I really, REALLY wished he had gone into more detail about Hannah and Nathan's newly married life, but instead, once they were married, he seemed to skip forward too far into the ...more

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Feb 26, 2009

Poiema rated it

Rich life story of a woman who belongs to a tight-knit family farm community. From childhood to old age, the voice of Hannah Coulter reflects on the significant and the minute moments of her life. She draws a haunting portrait of the rural life that was once so typical but was drawing to an end after WWII. Have we as a culture progressed? Or have we lost the wonderful sense of purpose and community that Hannah recounts in her memoir?

quote: "Love is what carries you, for it ...more

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Jan 30, 2012

Ann rated it

This was the first book that I read by Wendell Berry, but it started me on the rest of his books. I love not only the characters but also the sense of place and of history that Berry invokes. Hannah, the protagonist, grows up in and around the town of Port William, Kentucky, the scene of many other of Berry's books. The books are not a straight series, but each book acquaints you with a few of the characters, who then appear, usally as secondary characters, in the other books. The sense of conti...more

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Nov 23, 2010

Timothy Butler rated it

It's beautiful. Berry reminds us that we are constituted by our loves, and that we find peace as we love, and that to love is to be altogether given--to another, to a place, to a people. But more important, he reminds us that we are to love what is before us: "Nathan said, 'Don't complain about the chance you had,' in the same way exactly that he used to tell the boys, 'Don't cuss the weather.' . . . you mustn't wish for another life. You mustn't want to be somebody else."

...moreIt's beautiful. Berry reminds us that we are constituted by our loves, and that we find peace as we love, and that to love is to be altogether given--to another, to a place, to a people. But more important, he reminds us that we are to love what is before us: "Nathan said, 'Don't complain about the chance you had,' in the same way exactly that he used to tell the boys, 'Don't cuss the weather.' . . . you mustn't wish for another life. You mustn't want to be somebody else."

Against this is the call to a "better life" and the promise of "fulfillment" and "freedom" in a "better place." But there is no better life and no better place. Fulfillment and freedom are right here, available within the possibility that one can love another. And there is no better place: We are what is before us. We are our loves. And so, if we are wise and live wisely, this will be said of us: "They aren't going any place, they aren't getting ready to become anything but what they are, and so their lives are not fretful and hankering. And they are all still here."

I love it.

To entice you:
"Now I know what we were trying to stand for, and what I believe we did stand for: the possibility that among the world's wars and sufferings two people could love each other for a long time, until death and beyond, and could make a place for each other that would be a part of their love, as their love for each other would be a way of loving their place. This love would be one of the acts of the greater love that holds and cherishes all the world." (67-68.)

"And he was a rock to me, but now I knew that he had been shaken. . . . and he was shaken for life, and deep in the night he needed to touch me. I didn't know the reason then, but now I know that some old nightmare of the war had come back to him and frightened him awake. And ever so quietly, ever so gently, so as not to wake me, he would touch me. I would pretend to sleep on, so as not to disturb him wiht the thought that he had wakened me. It was not a lover's touch. As I knew partly then but know completely now, he needed to know that he was here and I was here with him, that he had come from the world of war, again, to this. Reassured, he would sleep again, and I too would sleep." (173.)

"I am watching him, but he has not yet seen me. And now he sees me. The expression on his face does not change, but now his intention has changed, he is walking toward me and nothing else. As he comes closer he smiles a little, still whistling. I know that when he comes to where I am he will give me a hug, and I want him to. I know how it is going to feel, the entire touch of him. He looks at me with a look I know. The shiver of the altogether given passes over me from head to foot." (186.)(less)

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Oct 10, 2010

Trudy rated it

This was the first of Berry's Port Williams books for me and I enjoyed it. I think it will appeal to people who also like The Number 1 Ladies Detective Agency and the Mitford series. Sweet and mellow, a life story told by the subject, with some nuggets of wisdom interjected on the way. It makes WW II out to be the turning point of American society's attitude toward the land on which we live; how we've ceased to be one with it by working it and gleaning from it the way people used to do before...moreThis was the first of Berry's Port Williams books for me and I enjoyed it. I think it will appeal to people who also like The Number 1 Ladies Detective Agency and the Mitford series. Sweet and mellow, a life story told by the subject, with some nuggets of wisdom interjected on the way. It makes WW II out to be the turning point of American society's attitude toward the land on which we live; how we've ceased to be one with it by working it and gleaning from it the way people used to do before the invention of machines and large corporations and stock markets.

Some good quotes: "He loved the old free work-swapping with our kinfolks and friends, who needed no bossing but out of their regard and respect for one another did what they were supposed to do. When we would have to hire somebody, as we sometimes did, and he proved unsatisfactory, as he usually did, Nathan would say, 'Another damned employee.' And that was the harshest criticism he ever made of the children: 'You are acting like a damned employee.' "

"One of the attractions of moving away into the life of employment [as opposed to a life of subsistence farming], I think, is being disconnected and free, unbothered by membership [in a community that knows and looks after each other for generations]. It is a life of beginnings without memories, but is is a life too that ends without being remembered. The life of membership with all its cumbers is traded away for the life of employment that makes itself free by forgetting you clean as a whistle when you are not of any more use. When they get to retirement age [people] will be cast out of place and out of mind like worn-out replaceable parts, to be alone at the last maybe and soon forgotten. 'But the membership,' Andy said, 'keeps the memories even of horses and mules and milk cows and dogs.' "

"Living without expectations is hard but, when you can do it, good. Living without hope is harder, and that is bad. You have got to have hope and you mustn't shirk it."

"The old harvest crews and their talk and laughter at kitchen tables loaded with food have been replaced by machines, and by migrant laborers who eat at the store. The old thrift that once kept us alive has been replaced by extravagance and waste. People are living as if they think they are in a movie. They are all looking in one direction, toward 'a better place,' and what they see is no thicker than a screen."

There is also a haunting chapter on the battle of Okinawa, in which one of the main characters is reported to have participated. I think every politician who promotes war should have to memorize this chapter. (less)

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Jan 06, 2010

Carole rated it

This author belies the claim that men and women are too different to really understand each other. Writing as a woman, in first person, Berry wonderfully expresses a feminine response to war, loss, and, most of all, love. I'm anxious to read his other writings, including those from a male perspective.

Some favorite quotes:

"As I have told it over, the past visible again in the present, the dead living still in their absence, this dream of time seems to come to rest i...moreThis author belies the claim that men and women are too different to really understand each other. Writing as a woman, in first person, Berry wonderfully expresses a feminine response to war, loss, and, most of all, love. I'm anxious to read his other writings, including those from a male perspective.

Some favorite quotes:

"As I have told it over, the past visible again in the present, the dead living still in their absence, this dream of time seems to come to rest in eternity. My mind, I think, has started to become, it is close to being, the room of love where the absent are present, the dead are alive, time is eternal, and all the creatures prosperous. The room of love is the love that holds us all, and it is not ours. It goes back before we were born. It goes all the way back. It is Heaven's. Or it is Heaven, and we are in it only by willingness. By whose love...do we love this world and ourselves and one another? Do you think we invented it ourselves? I ask with confidence, for I know you know we didn't."

"Compared to nearly everybody else, the Branches have led a sort of futureless life. They have planned and provided as much as they needed to, but they take little thought for the morrow. They aren't going any place, they aren't getting ready to become anything but what they are, and so their lives are not fretful and hankering. And they are all still here, still farming. They are here, and if the world lasts they are going to be here for quite a while. If I had "venture capital" to invest, I think I would invest it in the Branches."

"And so Nathan required me to think a thought that has stayed with me a long time and has traveled a long way. It passed through everything I know and changed it all. The chance you had is the life you've got. You can make complaints about what people, including you, make of their lives after they have got them, and about what people make of other people's lives...but you mustn't wish for another life. You mustn't want to be somebody else. What you must do is this: "Rejoice everymore. Pray without ceasing. In every thing give thanks." I am not all the way capable of so much, but those are the right instructions."(less)

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Oct 03, 2011

Corinne rated it

I became interested in this book after hearing a glowing review of it on the Diane Rehm radio show.

A book that contains the reminiscences of a twice widowed woman named Hannah Coulter. Berry has a beautiful writing style, full of imagery, yet as simple as his main character and her life.

A valuable look into life as it was for a farming family from the Depression on. This is not a gripping page turner, but rather a gem to savor and think about.

Really made me think...more

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Sep 18, 2011

Jacob McGill rated it

· review of another edition

I found this to be an interesting tale of changing cultures from the early 1900s to the 2000s. There are several times in the story where the narrator reflects back on decisions made or cultural shifts and asks provocative questions. I thought the idea that "giving children the education they deserved (college)," was bound to push them away from home was very insightful. Why should we expect the educated to come back and live humble lives as farmers? (I am by no means saying that farme...more

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May 17, 2011

Nathan rated it

Berry captures yet another Port William life in "Hannah Coulter." And he also captures something of an old Americana that is quickly fading, fading, gone. Some quintessential Berry themes show up - the fight of the old way against the new myth-of-progress; life that was once lived in cooperation with the land rather than co-opted against it; and faith, hope, and love that cover over a multitude of clamoring sins. But the book is different - and endearing - in that it tells the story...more

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Mar 20, 2011

Paula Warnken rated it

Written by Kentucky environmental philosopher, poet, essayist, and novelist Wendell Berry, this fictional memoir tells the story of life in rural Kentucky from the 1920's through the early 2000's. Hannah Coulter is one of the series of stories of people from Port William, a fictional town on the the Ohio River, somewhere between Louisville and Cincinnati. Through Hannah's story we learn about family farm life in Kentucky and the details of close relationships developed through the interdependenc...more

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Dec 29, 2011

Bob Stocker rated it

Wendell Berry's novel Hannah Coulter tells the life story of a farmer's wife who was born in 1922 and lived into the 21st century. There are few surprises. Many of the events in her life typify the changes in rural America during the last century. Even events that might otherwise be surprising are foreshadowed. Nevertheless, I found the book enthralling. The prose is simple, at times beautiful, and frequently seasoned with wisdom.

This is a book with a message. Berry loves nature and...more

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Aug 28, 2007

Patrick Hennessy rated it

I have such a tenderness toward Berry, for his way of thinking, participating in this world, that this, what I want to do here, is not a review at all, certainly not literary, though he is a fine writer, but a recommendation for living, for thoughtfulness. Chapter 10, if I correctly recall, is the only one I did not cry during.

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Aug 19, 2011

Sara Bartley rated it

Shelves: novels

I love Wendell Berry. I have never been disappointed by his work, whether fiction or non-fiction, and am continually amazed at the breadth of his ability as a writer. Hannah Coulter is one of the novels in his series about the residents of a fictional farm town called Port William. This is the only one in the series (that I'm aware of) whose main character is a woman, endearing itself to me above the others.

If you're new to Berry I'll tell you that his novels are beautifully writt...more

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Dec 28, 2011

Trevor Thompson rated it

Shelves: fiction, literature

Reread in light of upcoming discussion I'm leading on this novel. So many lines stood out, like a pointer with a sharp end:

"Love in this world doesn't come out of thin air. It is not something thought up. Like ourselves, it grows out of the ground. It has a body and a place."

"Most people now are looking for a 'better place,' which means that a lot of them will end up in a worse one. I think that is what Nathan learned from his time in the army and the ...moreReread in light of upcoming discussion I'm leading on this novel. So many lines stood out, like a pointer with a sharp end:

"Love in this world doesn't come out of thin air. It is not something thought up. Like ourselves, it grows out of the ground. It has a body and a place."

"Most people now are looking for a 'better place,' which means that a lot of them will end up in a worse one. I think that is what Nathan learned from his time in the army and the war. He saw a lot of places, and he came home. I think he gave up the idea that there is a better place somewhere else. There is no 'better place' than this, not in this world. And it is by the place we've got, and our love for it and our keeping of it, that this world is joined to Heaven."

"Nathan and I had to get used to each other. We had to get used to being two parents to Little Margaret. We had to get our ways and habits into some sort of alignment, making some changes in ourselves that were not always easy. We had to get used to our house. We had to get used to our place. It takes years, maybe it takes longer than a lifetime, to know a place, especially if you are getting to know it as a place to live and work, and you are getting to know it by living and working in it. But we had to begin.

Burley's sermon: "Oh, yes, brothers and sisters, we are members one of another. The difference, beloved, ain't in who is and who's not, but in who knows it and who don't. Oh, my friends, there ain't no nonmembers, living nor dead nor yet to come. Do you know it? Or do you don't? A man is a member of a woman and worm. A woman is a member of a man and a mole. Oh, beloved, it's all one piece of work."

"What the marriage had in it, of course, was Nathan and me. We were in it together because of our plighting of troth, his to me, mine to him, and that was one thing. But we were together in it also because, from time to time, often enough, we were in it by desire, we met entirely in it and were one flesh. What that was and is and means is not altogether going to be found in words."

Andy says to Hannah, talking about her children: "Your worried because they've left the membership," and he smiled, knowing we both knew whose word that was. "They've gone over from the world of membership to the world of organization. Nathan would say the world of employment." And Hannah muses: "One of the attractions of moving away into the life of employment, I think, is being disconnected and free, unbothered by membership. It is a life of beginnings without memories, but it is a life too that ends without being remembered. The life of membership with all its cumbers is traded away for the life of employment that makes itself free by forgetting you clean as a whistle when you are not of any more use. When they get to retirement age, Margaret and Mattie and Caleb will be cast out of place and out of mind like worn-out replaceable parts, to be alone at the last maybe and soon forgotten." "But the membership," Andy said, "keeps the memories even of horses and mules and milk cows and dogs."(less)

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Nov 18, 2011

Melissa rated it

Shelves: history, literary-fiction

Hannah Coulter reflects on her life, having lived through the Great Depression as a child, married during WWII, lost a husband, had a child, remarried, had two more children, and outlived her 2nd husband. The book is not so much event-focused as it is reflective, reminiscent, thoughtful, and descriptive, at times too much for my taste. But it was a lovely read and it has caused me to really think about several great topics from a new perspective--the purpose of education, the desire for parents...more

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Jan 13, 2012

Webster Bull rated it

Shelves: novels

This is a post that first appeared on my blog, “Witness.” http://http://witness2christ.blogspot.co...

For a long time I was restless—never in my marriage, seldom in my work, but most often simply in my location. I wanted to move to Maine, to Ireland, to North Dakota. I hear Katie screaming, “North Dakota?! Have a nice time—by yourself.” I thought that life would be better if I moved: easier, greener, more serene. I was looking for a geographical cure.

But I am married to a wise...more

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Oct 07, 2011

Emily Flury rated it

· review of another edition

Hannah Coulter is a simple story of woman's life on a farm. She lives through many hardships such as loss during World War 2 and illness of loved ones. Hannah also experiences many triumphs in her life. I guess this story is about how to take the good, take the bad, take it all to see that there you have the facts of life. The story is filled with many touching moments whether funny, serious, sad, or strange. One thing that was different about this book was the fact that it wasn't so much t...more

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May 04, 2009

Darby rated it

i feel a little bruised, finishing this one. it reminds me of a marilynne robinson novel, but told in a simpler voice, and more interested in place than personality. robinson mines her characters' inner lives, berry leaves them some mystery, but both treat the passage of time and the burden of memory gently.

the bruised feeling comes from berry hitting close to home. i'm two generations removed from my farm roots, and my grandparents' work and life (which they think is too plain and ...more

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Aug 15, 2011

Adam Shields rated it

· review of another edition

Short review: I really enjoyed this book. I do not read enough novels. But this helps remind me why novels are important. It is a wonderful story of a woman (she recounts her story in first person the entire book) from the time she was a young girl in the depression until the story ends in 2001. She recounts WWII, her marriage and children, living the life of a farmer in changing times, her children and grandchildren's moving away and losing connection to the land. Nostalgia in the best se...more

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Jun 23, 2011

Lisa rated it

This is the first book I've read by this author and I really enjoyed it. I like the author's style of succinctly writing about what the characters feel, things that are difficult to express in words and I could picture every scene unfold. I loved the trip down memory lane with the character Hannah and I couldn't help but reminisce of my own grandparents as I read this story. It also made me think of how much life has changed in a very short period of time since World War II in our country. I...more

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Oct 05, 2009

Michael rated it

Before beginning the review, I should confess that I have not read the other Port William novels, although I did hear the author read from Jayber Crow before its publication and am a serious student of his essays and poetry. That being said, I loved this book. Not only is the language beautiful in its imagery and rhythms but the female narrator/protagonist is very believable in her speech and perspectives. Berry has done a remarkable job of wedding the passing of the rural America of small famil...more

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Oct 18, 2010

Nettie rated it

Jim read the book 1st since it was a gift from Jonathan & Mary Beth. We compared notes & realized much of what we've been experiencing is written in this book. Especially with regard to how we work for a place for the family & now they're all moved away. The closest one is an hour away & we are happy about that. We are also very grateful the others make it a priority & take time to visit often - not easy for Jonathan & Mary Beth with 4 children & the business he runs. We are blessed with a famil...more

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May 09, 2011

Tommy rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

This was my first Wendell Berry novel, and it may not have been the best one. Berry upholds his small-town ideal through the eyes of a woman who lives her whole life in Berry's fictional Port William; as she ages, her children gradually distance themselves from the family farm so they can enjoy more modern pursuits. I'm sympathetic to the plight of dying farm communities, but the portrayal of such a place is too squeaky-clean here. Was mid-century rural Kentucky really this free from the social ...more

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Jun 30, 2010

Adam rated it

Quite possibly the most maudlin of all Berry's fiction, I doubt I would ever read this one a second time. Also there seemed to be a more than usual amount of overlap here--especially early in the book--with previously-told Port William stories. Yet there are some great passages, and I wonder how I would have felt if this had been one of the first of Berry's novels that I'd read. Now I have only two left to read, and the fact that Hannah's voice is very clearly Berry's own (and little more) wo...more

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Jan 17, 2010

Janet rated it

This rocketed to the top of my favorite books list, and I think it will stay there, maybe forever. Can't wait to read more of Berry's work.
I sought out one of his novels after reading a short story that was one of the most profound short stories I think I'd ever read. Beyond the story itself, I was taken by the author's artistry. Knowing that some authors can master the short story but don't do as well sustaining a novel, I wanted to see how Berry did with the longer format.
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About Wendell Berry

Wendell Berry is a conservationist, farmer, essayist, novelist, professor of English and poet. He was born August 5, 1934 in Henry County, Kentucky where he now lives on a farm. The New York Times has called Berry the "prophet of rural America."

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The Unsettling of America: Culture and Agriculture

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Quotes from Hannah Coulter

“Love is what carries you, for it is always there, even in the dark, or most in the dark, but shining out at times like gold stitches in a piece of embroidery. ” — 25 people liked it

“I took her into bed with me and propped myself up with pillows against the headboard to let her nurse. As she nursed and the milk came, she began a little low contented sort of singing. I would feel milk and love flowing from me to her as once it had flowed to me. It emptied me. As the baby fed, I seemed slowly to grow empty of myself, as if in the presence of that long flow of love even grief could not stand.” — 11 people liked it

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