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Journal of a Solitude

4.2 of 5 stars 4.20 · rating details · 1,122 ratings · 120 reviews

"I am here alone for the first time in weeks," May Sarton begins this book, "to take up my 'real' life again at last. That is what is strange—that friends, even passionate love,are not my real life, unless there is time alone in which to explore what is happening or what has happened." In this journal, she says, "I hope to break through into the rough, rocky depths,to the...more

Paperback, 208 pages

Published October 17th 1992 by W. W. Norton & Company (first published 1973)

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Sep 16, 2012 K.D. Oliveros rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to K.D. by: 501 Must Read Books (Memoirs)

Shelves: 501, saddest, lyrical, philosophical, memoirs, lesbian, feminist

May Sarton (1912-1995) was a lesbian writer. Born in Belgium, her family escaped to England when Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in 1914, the incident that triggered the First World War. One year later, her family moved again, this time to Boston. In 1945, she met her partner for 13 years, Judy Matlack. She wrote many poetry, novels and non-fiction books but she was most known for her memoirs. This book, Journal of a Solitude is said to be her best.

This memoir includes almost daily ent...more May Sarton (1912-1995) was a lesbian writer. Born in Belgium, her family escaped to England when Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in 1914, the incident that triggered the First World War. One year later, her family moved again, this time to Boston. In 1945, she met her partner for 13 years, Judy Matlack. She wrote many poetry, novels and non-fiction books but she was most known for her memoirs. This book, Journal of a Solitude is said to be her best.

This memoir includes almost daily entries of her life for the span of one year (1972-1973). The title is about her preference to be alone when she writes poetry, the literature form she likes best. I am still to see a poetry book by her but I have a feeling that most of her poems are sad because this book is also sad. Don't get me wrong, though, she is not a hermit living alone in a cabin in the middle of the woods. In the book, she mentioned about her visitors too like my favorite Virginia Woolf (also a lesbian) and other writers whose names just don't ring a bell. In fact, I did not know anything about May Sarton until this book. Thanks to the 501 Must Read Books for recommending this to me.

Sarton was 60 when she wrote this book. It was just two years after her partner for 13 years died. So, naturally, she was still grieving. However, she did not mention her grief in the book (denial? trying to forget?). Rather she made herself busy doing the household chores, tend to her garden, teaching at the university and meeting with her friends. Superficially, everything seems to be ordinary except that when you read her journals, you know that she is still deeply hurt inside. Then since she was a good poet (based on what I read in her journals), her words were lyrical and heartfelt if not magical. I think those are what make this book really loved by women who are feminists and/or lovers of good literature. Think of Anne Frank at 60 who knows how to write good poetry and instead of hiding inside the library, her emotions are the ones hidden inside her heart and poured out only via the choicest and the most beautiful rhythmic verses.

My favorite part is about Perley Cole, his gardener. Widowed by his wife due to her long illness, he had to continue working tending Sarton's garden. He died in the ambulance and he had no service and was cremated. Sarton writes: "It is the loneliest dying and the loneliest death I ever heard of. How many times he has said to me in these last months, 'I never thought it would end like this.'... How is one to accept such a death? What have we come to when people are shoveled away, as if that whole life of hard work, dignity, self-respect, could be discarded at the end like an old beer can?"

I liked this book. (less)

12 likes · like · see review

Jul 23, 2011 Emilie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 11, autobiography, shakespeares-sister, nonfiction

this was written, according to carolyn heilbrun in Writing a Woman's Life, as a conscious attempt by may sarton to rewrite her own autobiography in a more authentic way. when may sarton realised that her autobiography Plant Dreaming Deep left out so much of her anger and pain, she wanted to revisit the time and to be more honest about what her life was really like, and to represent and own her own story as it is, as opposed to how convention says it should be. this is an attempt to tell the more...more

10 likes · like · see review

Apr 06, 2012 Dorothee Lang rated it 4 of 5 stars

It was the first paragraph, included in a review, that made me go and order the book:

"I am here alone for the first time in weeks to take up my 'real' life again at last. That is what is strange—that friends, even passionate love,are not my real life, unless there is time alone in which to explore what is happening or what has happened... I hope to break through into the rough, rocky depths, to the matrix itself."

From this journal, there is so much that i marked. Sarton observes her own solitud...more

3 likes · like · see review

Jun 15, 2007 Jamie rated it 5 of 5 stars

Sarton's writing amazes me. It's not everyone who can say, "Hey, I'm going to shut myself in a house for a really long time and write about watering my plants and my depression, and it's going to be really beautiful and interesting." But Sarton makes it happen. The eloquence and introspection that makes up this book is absolutely fascinating.

9 likes · like · see review

Dec 25, 2008 Allison rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: drink-the-bleach-drink-the-bleach

The author's fixation on flowers and fluffy critters, coupled with her intense depressive streak, results in a journal that often reads like Mary Engelbreit having a bad day. A really bad day. Never having been much for nature poetry--nature's pretty, nature's nice, I've just never felt the urge to rhapsodize it and I can't get behind poets who do--I found it difficult to relate. This was disappointing, as I do identify with much of what she talks about here: the love/hate relationship with soli...more

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Jul 29, 2009 Katie Kurtz added it

I picked up a copy of this book at a used bookstore in Springfield, Vermont. The guy didn't accept plastic because, "You just never know what kind of information they'll get out of you!"

From what I've read so far, this is more of a journal of anger and floral arrangements. Written while she lived in New Hampshire, Sarton's solitude is akin to Thoreau's Walden Pond - not very solitary. Curious to see what she discovers about herself and if she learns how to manage her anger without two-sherry lu...more

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Apr 24, 2013 Julie Luekenga rated it 5 of 5 stars

This is the first book I've read by May Sarton, but it won't be the last. May Sarton was born in 1912, and according the biographical information I found, came to the US when she was a young girl. Previous to this book, she had written a book called, Plant Dreaming Deep, which she believed gave people a one-sided and false perception of her. Journal of Solitude, was her attempt, in part, to add to the version of herself she felt was incomplete.

In Journal of Solitude, Sarton keeps a journal for...more

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Sep 04, 2012 Catherine Wylie rated it 3 of 5 stars

May Sarton was 58 when she kept a journal of about a year's time in an old House in New Hampshire. Though the main theme is a woman settling in to her middle aged single life as author and poet, it is also about the life-long quest to grow up in and best utilize the mostly solitary lifestyle. She makes many good points about solitude and dealing with one's shadow self,the longing for something more (with and without others,) as well as the acceptance that the extra space one has been granted, is...more

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Oct 06, 2011 Cynthia Davidson rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: pi-book-club

I selected this one for our book club, in part because I'm an inveterate journal keeper myself, and thought it might inspire our members to take up the inky habit.
Not sure if any have, tho' I'm still at it, and happy to take instruction from writers like May Sarton, in how to mine one's old journal entries for future publication...
Sarton is a wee coy, in not revealing that the 'lover' she refers to in this book is another woman, but this is understandable, in her day & age, when 'coming out'...more

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Aug 24, 2011 Andrea rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011-books

A friend lent me this book many months ago, but last week the timing was finally right to read it, and I'm so glad that I waited for the right time, when I could sit and be quiet with the book. The journal could be read fast - it is a slim book - but I read it over the course of a few days, copying out long passages in my journal so that I likely transcribed half the book. The journal was one of those experiences of reading someone who is writing your experience. I have too many quotes to write...more

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Jul 29, 2011 Valerie rated it 5 of 5 stars

This book was absolutely wonderful, and I recently re-read it because I love the descriptive and picturesque prose that Eleanor Marie Sarton, pen name was May Sarton, uses throughout the book. All through this book, I was actually there, or present, feeling this lady's emotions and thoughts. What a great loss to American literature when she died in 1995. I rarely enjoy these types of biographical journals, but this one stood out, as Ms. Sarton is very, very good at being able to put into words t...more

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Jul 04, 2010 Diane rated it 5 of 5 stars

May Sarton is a staggering writer. This journal of prose, reads like poetry. She consciously observes everything: from daily, physical minutia, (she is a gardener,) to her own psychological motivations, to spiritual implications. There is no place she won't look, no thing too unimportant to have meaning. By observing with honesty, and sharing her weaknesses, she gives the reader permission to do the same. Nothing gets shelved (stuffed away) in her unconscious. It feels as if she comes to each mo...more

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May 16, 2013 Patty rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013, women-writers, writing, family, new-hampshire, depression, poetry, poets, non-fiction, autobiography, memoir, solitude

I had not planned to bring this book with me on my vacation, but apparently I needed to finish it. Turns out it is very relevant to my journey towards retirement.

I like the fact that Sarton calls her journal "a" solitude. It is clear to me that each opportunity for solitude, aloneness, would be and should be very different. It has been true for me. I have gone on retreat several times lately and each time there is something different I need to work on.

Sarton was 58 at the start of this journal...more

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May 26, 2011 Poppy rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

If Sarton had actually been the persona she pretends to in her journal, I would still have not liked her very much. Her writing is beautiful, and the words stand notwithstanding several issues that stick out for me. There are several quotes that do, in fact, describe me - "How Unconscious we are, often, that giving may actually be asking, asking at the very least for attention", her long discussions on the difficulty women, particularly married women, face in bring their creative self to the wor...more

1 like · like · see review

Sep 27, 2009 Doreen rated it 3 of 5 stars

The essence of this journal is that every creative person needs solitude in order to center themselves for the act of creation. Agree or disagree, I do believe that it's important that everyone, regardless of creative ability, learns how to be alright with themselves alone, because only very young children and the infirm should require constant attention from other people. Ms Sarton celebrates the pastoral life and touches on several interesting ideas, but nothing is fully explored. If I'd read...more

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Mar 07, 2012 Cheryl rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: memoir

First read when I was in my late twenties and living in the northwoods of Minnesota. I loved it, then, relating particularly to the author's struggle to find a balance between her inner/writer self and her outer/professional/social self. This time around, I was the same age as the author was when she wrote it, and I found her rants frustrating. I didn't want her to be dealing with the issues I associate late adolesnce. I was also disappointed that she didn't really seem to be writing about solit...more

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Mar 20, 2012 Callie rated it 5 of 5 stars

THANK YOU, my goodreads friend Elizabeth for alerting me to the existence of this book. I LOVED it and if I could give it ten stars, I would. Very rarely does one find a writer that feels almost like kin, or more than kin. A twin soul. People who love to read know the extreme pleasure derived from reading passages that express precisely your own thoughts. I found passages like that over and over in this book. I am the kind of reader who likes to clip along usually and get the gist of what a writ...more THANK YOU, my goodreads friend Elizabeth for alerting me to the existence of this book. I LOVED it and if I could give it ten stars, I would. Very rarely does one find a writer that feels almost like kin, or more than kin. A twin soul. People who love to read know the extreme pleasure derived from reading passages that express precisely your own thoughts. I found passages like that over and over in this book. I am the kind of reader who likes to clip along usually and get the gist of what a writer is saying but not with this book, the writing is too good. I wanted to read slowly and reread and savour every sentence. Perhaps because May Sarton is primarily a poet, her prose feels deeper, richer, more refined. It has gravity.

I feel like I did when I first stumbled on Thoreau's Walden when I was nineteen. I need to buy this book and be able to underline and make notes at will and return to it often for its wisdom and beauty, its nourishment. I will also hunt down everything by May Sarton and read it all!

Here are some passages:

"There is really only one possible prayer: Give me to do everything I do in the day with a sense of the sacredness of life. Give me to be in your presence, God, even though I know it only as absence."

"But in our effete American civilization few people are willing to pay the price of anything--a garden, children, a good marriage, a work of art. And they resent the small price they manage to pay."

"The garden is growth and change and that means loss as well as constant new treasures to make up for a few disasters."

"My faults too have been those of excess; I too have made emotional demands without being aware of what I was asking; I too have imagined that I was giving when I was battering at someone for attention. And it is just because I am aware of this that I am both kind and constantly alarmed and upset by a presence in my life that I did not want, that has imposed itself willy-nilly, and that finally creates repulsion because in it I must face my own faults magnified and distorted." (less)

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Feb 07, 2013 Andrea rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction, ladies

I totally dug this book -- it's definitely not everyone's thing, though. And I'm not really sure who I could ever recommend it to, but it was surely an excellent book for me to read at this time. I'm starting to discover writing and also discover solitude as I learn to cope with a chronic illness. This book, more than anything, made me feel like I'm not alone. Not alone in my bizarre rages, and in the frequency of the feeling of "not having gotten anything done". Also, I like cats a moderate amo...more

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Apr 01, 2010 Maryjoamani rated it 5 of 5 stars

Okay, so you're going to see a lot of May Sarton on my list since I'm undertaking a journey to explore her life in my own journal writing and I think she has over three dozen books of poetry, fiction, and journals out there. Though our life experiences seem so radically different, she touches on themes of creativity, depression, need for solitude, authenticity, and friendship with women that are essential to my life. I read a review of a biography about her that was quite negative and paints her...more

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Sep 07, 2007 Lynn rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: wanna-be hermits

For a person who wrote a book with "solitude" in the title, she sure has a lot of friends come over.

1 like · like · see review

Apr 22, 2009 Betsey rated it 4 of 5 stars

While reading this book I picked up Maya Angelou's, Letter to My Daughter. Angelou can take any personal experience and bring out the good. I don't know too many people who can share personal experiences about rape, abuse, depression, and make you feel good about yourself. If you need a quick uplifting book, this is the one for you.
Sarton, on the other hand, shares her life and experiences in a way that was more relatable to me. I found that I really respected this woman after reading her colle...more

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Nov 20, 2010 Diane rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: mature-reads

A raw journal of a writer and poet who must battle with untreated depression, anxiety attacks and rage. There isn't much nature in this book, but Sarton lives alone in the mountains and reflects about the flowers (which she gathers and must have in her rooms) and weather (forty below!). Being a lesbian and writing about homosexuality at that time made her work scandalous, yet was important for the women's rights movement as well as the future gay rights movement. An interesting introspection, wr...more

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Feb 21, 2012 Emily rated it 4 of 5 stars

If Sarton wanted to destroy the false myth of Paradise she thinks she inadvertently created in Plant Dreaming Deep, she did a good job in Journal of Solitude, where the overall impression she gives is of a person who is profoundly STRESSED OUT. But maybe that's the tension that's necessary for a writer (she explores this bottomless theme a little bit, which I liked--everyone has a different answer about suffering for one's art). She also has interesting insights about the way modern-day democrac...more

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May 07, 2009 Lynne-marie rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is an honest exploration of one writer's loneliness and (obviously) solitude as well as the struggles with writing and creativity. It is set in New Hampshire and sometimes seems as cold as the country Sarton is living in. I found it enheartening in the sense that if someone of Sarton's obvious talent and creativity as well as seeming balance and serenity has dealt in her life with doubts like these, then the doubts I face may be less measures of insignificance but of struggles with universa...more

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Apr 24, 2013 Denise rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: memoir-biography, literary-non-fiction

I didn't read this in one go. I read a few days in the journal as I had time over a period of three weeks. It seems to lend itself to that, much like reading letters or poetry or essays.

Although I have very little in common with May Sarton (age, location, background) I identify with her in as much as I agree that solitude is needed to remember who you are. We so often lose pieces of ourselves in relationship to others; we become more like them and less like ourselves. I identified with her stru...more

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Sep 07, 2012 L. Anne rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: memoir-diaries

There is much to like about May Sarton's journals. This journal covers a year of solitude that reads like an examination of conscience. For instance: "... I am an impossible creature, set apart by a temperament I have never learned to use as it could be used, thrown off by a word, a glance, a rainy day, or one drink too many. My need to be alone is balanced against my fear of what will happen when suddenly I enter the huge empty silence if I cannot find support there" (p. 12).

She is lovely beca...more

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Sep 09, 2012 Eve rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: memoir-diaries

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Jul 19, 2008 Mary rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: aNYONE WHO WANTS TO REEVALUATE HIS/HER LIFE GOALS AND VALUES.

I first read May Sarton while I was vacationing in Maine at Wells beach. Her writing touched me and drew me into her thoughts and opinions. Journal of a Solitude was my introduction to May Sarton and I haven't stopped reading her since. Reading her is like taking a tranquilizer. That can be good or bad, I suppose. I had no idea she was a lesbian until i started reading her novels. I am not a lesbian, but so enjoy her writing about her bouts with depression, her animals and her gardening.

The boo...more

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May 24, 2012 Deja rated it 4 of 5 stars

This was a lovely read. A poet/novelist/writer in a house by herself (okay, with a bird named Punch), a journal of her quiet days, an exploration of what it feels like to work alone, how she craves and needs and hates it, all at once. I like what she says about writing, about poetry, about love. And I deeply resonated with her emotional highs and lows. Somehow seeing them in someone else made them seem somehow so normal: like, hey, sometimes we have up days, days where we work and work hard and...more

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May 27, 2011 Bambi rated it 3 of 5 stars

Not phenomenal, but I liked it. Easy read, like a journal should. Felt like I could really relate to the author's inner emotional world. And well I loved the description of her daily life, her house with a huge garden, flowers in the house, the solitude. Sounds perfect to me,haha I would love to be away from everyone and everything right now, somewhere in the middle of nature, on a cottage surrounded by books, flowers, maybe a dog.

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About May Sarton

May Sarton (May 3, 1912-July 16, 1995) was an American poet, novelist, and memoirist born in Wondelgem, Belgium. Many of her novels and poems are pellucid reflections of the lesbian experience.

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Quotes from Journal of a Solitude

“Does anything in nature despair except man? An animal with a foot caught in a trap does not seem to despair. It is too busy trying to survive. It is all closed in, to a kind of still, intense waiting. Is this a key? Keep busy with survival. Imitate the trees. Learn to lose in order to recover, and remember that nothing stays the same for long, not even pain, psychic pain. Sit it out. Let it all pass. Let it go.” — 135 people liked it

“There is no doubt that solitude is a challenge and to maintain balance within it a precarious business. But I must not forget that, for me, being with people or even with one beloved person for any length of time without solitude is even worse. I lose my center. I feel dispersed, scattered, in pieces. I must have time alone in which to mull over my encounter, and to extract its juice, its essence, to understand what has really happened to me as a consequence of it.” — 32 people liked it

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