Wendell Berry

Recommended: Wendell Berry Author(s): Charles Fothergill Source: The English Journal, Vol. 74, No. 2 (Feb., 1985), pp. 89-90 Published by: National Council of Teachers of English Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/816284 Accessed: 14-09-2017 11:52 UTC

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide

range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and

facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at

http://about.jstor.org/terms

National Council of Teachers of English is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The English Journal

This content downloaded from 76.165.210.2 on Thu, 14 Sep 2017 11:52:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Recommended: Wendell Berry

Charles Fothergill

Emerson, Thoreau, John Muir, and Robert Frost-there are voices in

American literature that speak to us of a deep and rich life, a life that exemplifies concern for each other and our good earth. Add to that chorus the voice of Wendell Berry, for Berry celebrates the restorative powers of nature and sings to us of a life that Emerson called "a radiat-

ing focus of good will." In his es- says, poems, and novels Wendell Berry offers hope for the health of this planet and its people.

In The Long-Legged House (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1969), his first collection of essays, Berry writes that many of our atti- tudes about life and the earth are

based on assumptions we inherited from our frontier forefathers. The frontiersman saw the natural world

as an enemy to be plundered. For him, the riches of the earth were inexhaustible. For him, economic license and political freedom were the same. A corollary to these axi- oms is "that a free man is somehow

morally obligated to get rich, his worth directly proportionate to his wealth." He was willing "to be subsidized by posterity, to become rich at the world's expense."

Many of Berry's poems decry the way our green earth has been abused. In a poem from his collection en- titled Clearing (New York: Har- court, Brace, Jovanovich, 1977) he reflects on the farm land of his

youth.

From year to year watching from his porch, my grandfather

saw a barn roof slowly rise into sight above a neighboring ridge as the plows and rains wore down the hill.

Not all people approach the land with what Berry calls the "con- quistador" mentality. There were and are those who came to the task

with a deep sense of stewardship. In The Gift of Good Land: Further Essays Cultural and Agricultural (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1981) Berry writes of his observa- tions of the farmers in the Andes, the Amish of Indiana, and the In- dian farmers of the Southwest as well as others who farm on a small scale. For "smallness tends to be

prerequisite of thrift and care in the use of the world." Small is beautiful.

These people work their land with a "highly refined ecological sensi- tivity."

Unfortunately, with the exodus of 21 million people from the farms to the cities between 1946 and 1976, the "economy of thrift" was largely replaced by "agribusiness" and "ag- rispecialists." A plutocracy of tech- nocrats created "operations" and lost sight of the old virtues of pro- priety, balance, and diversity. Stew- ardship of the soil requires discipline and responsibility; agribusiness fre- quently employs wasteful and harm- ful cultivation techniques. The Un- settling of America: Culture and Agriculture (San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1977) charts our estrangement from the land and demonstrates that

the small family farm can be oper- ated on principles that are "sources

of cultural, spiritual and agricul- tural wealth." We do not have to

sacrifice quality for abundance; we do not need to rely on chemicals that create new problems. We can live on the earth and with the earth

without abusing it. Thinking of ourselves as only liv-

ing on the earth, we have "an obses- sion with short-term results." We are infatuated with the linear notion

of progress; we forget that the pat- terns of the earth are cyclic. In A Continuous Harmony: Essays Cul- tural and Agricultural (New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1975) Berry reminds us of evils that befall us when we lose sight of the cyclic patterns of life to which we belong. When we fail to view things in long terms, we tend to sacrifice "the life and health of the world" for our

temporary pleasures. We tend to pollute our waters, overuse our land, and strip minerals from our earth without a care in the world for our

posterity. Even when we become aware of

these life-threatening problems, fre- quently we don't "think little." What does Berry mean by encourag- ing us to "think little"? In A Con- tinuous Harmony he argues that we abdicated our responsibilities and assumed organizations would do the job, rectify the wrong. The real work of change should begin at home.

We cannot feed or clothe our- selves, or entertain ourselves, or communicate with each other, or be charitable or neighborly or

February 1985 89

This content downloaded from 76.165.210.2 on Thu, 14 Sep 2017 11:52:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

neighborly or loving, or even re- spect ourselves without recourse to a merchant or a corporation or a public service organization or an agency of the government or a style setter or an expert.

We have become a nation of organi- zations instead of a nation of indi-

viduals. Berry is not against organi- zations, but he reminds us that "there is no public crisis which is not also private." We must see to it that we don't subsidize evil with our own behavior.

In some of his poems in The Country of Marriage (New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1973) and Farming: A Handbook (New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1973), Berry assumes the persona of the Mad Farmer, a character who practices what Berry preaches. The Mad Farmer laments that "to be sane in a mad time/is bad for the

brains, worse/for the heart," but he offers good advice to those who are angry about current abuses. "So, friends every day do something/that won't compute." The Mad Farmer has contempt for technocracy and puts his "faith in the two inches of humus/that will build under the

trees/every thousand years." Another character who lives close

to the land is Old Jack Beechum

in Berry's novel, The Memory of Old Jack (New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1974). Old Jack, a retired farmer who has lived close

to the earth for 92 years, tended his Kentucky farm with care and watched his land go into other less loving hands. Berry weaves Old Jack's memories into a tapestry commemorating old values of stew- ardship and love. Traveling with Old Jack through his days as a boy, as a husband, a lover, and a farmer, we see the effect he had on the farm families and citizens of

Port William, Kentucky. In the final paragraph of his novel, after Old Jack dies, Berry writes,

And in the hush of it they are aware of something that passed from them and now returns: his

stubborn biding with them to the end, his keeping of faith with them who would live after him, and what perhaps none of them has yet thought to call his gentle- ness, his long gentleness toward them and toward his place where they are at work.

Old Jack dies but his influence lives on. He has become a part of the cycle of life.

In The Wheel (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1982), his most

recent collection of poems, Berry sings of the eternal process of "birth, growth, maturity, death and decay." Nothing is ever lost "for it takes circles/of years, of birth and death/ for patterns, eternal form/visible in mystery." A person's life passes into Life. And that passing is a story,

not of time, but the forever returning events of light, ancient knowledge seeking its new minds. The man at dawn

in spring of the year, going to the fields, visionary of seed and desire, is timeless as a star.

According to Wendell Berry the roots of twentieth century aliena- tion are the way we treat each other and the way we treat our land. His poems, essays and novels are refreshing and healing. Thoreau complained of the many who were whacking away at the branches on the tree of evil. Wendell Berry is cutting away at the roots.

A new contributor, Charles Fothergill teaches at Country Day School in Louisville.

Penn State Conference on Rhetoric and Composition

Richard Lanham and Andrea Lunsford will be the Major Consultants at the fourth Penn State Conference on Rhetoric and Composition to be held July 9-12, 1985, at State College, Pennsylvania. Featured Speakers will include Linda Flower, Lee Odell, James Raymond, and Stephen Toulmin. Those interested in participating are invited to present papers, demonstrations, or workshops on topics related to rhetoric or the teaching of writing-on composition, rhetorical theory and history, basic writing, technical and business communication, advanced composition, writing across the curriculum, and so forth. One-page proposals will be accepted through April 15. Contact Professor Jack Selzer, Department of English, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802.

90 English Journal

This content downloaded from 76.165.210.2 on Thu, 14 Sep 2017 11:52:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms