In his essay “Standing by Words,” Berry argues that the sentence is the indispensable tool with which we see, feel and know the world. “A sentence,” he writes, “is both the opportunity and the limit of thought—what we have to think with, and what we have to think in.” Along with writing and teaching, Berry farms. Since moving back to his home state from New York in 1964, he has worked a few acres on a hillside in the bluegrass, overlooking the Kentucky River. Like most farmers he is unsentimental about nature, seeing it as something to wrestle with and work round.
