Nonfiction

Writing the Sacred into the Real

“Makes connections between the unknown and the possible.” —GEORGIA REVIEW
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In Writing the Sacred into the Real, poet and essayist Alison Hawthorne Deming describes locales that are dear to her because they are still shaped by nature. She begins along the shores of the North Atlantic, on Grand Manan Island in the Bay of Fundy, and moves on to Provincetown, Massachusetts; Tucson, Arizona; and Poamoho, Hawaii.

Deming argues that the farther we remove ourselves from wild settings, the farther we are removed from our spiritual centers. Offering nature writing as a deliverance from our frantic times, Deming encourages a stronger connection with our surroundings. She believes that the arts allow us to fall again “into harmony with place and each other,” to write the sacred into the real.

ISBN
9781571312495
Publish Date
Pages
160
Dimensions
5 × 7.88 × 0.5 in
Weight
6.3 oz
Author

Alison Hawthorne Deming

Alison Hawthorne Deming is the author of numerous works of nonfiction and poetry, most recently Zoologies: On Animals and the Human Spirit and the collections of poems Stairway to Heaven and Death Valley: Painted Light. She is currently the Agnese Nelms Haury Chair of Environment and Social Justice and Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Arizona.

Praise and Prizes

  • “Often employing metaphor, Alison Hawthorne Deming makes connections between the unknown and the possible, creating a kind of understanding that is different from the observable… . She realizes the need for something to replace the closeness with nature that grows from remaining in place, a closeness threatened in a mobile culture.”

    Georgia Review