The book of delights essays by ross gay
Callista Buchen reviews The Book of Delights by Ross Gay.
Monthly reviews of books written by Indiana authors are made possible by the Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Awards and Indiana Humanities. Opinions expressed in this review are solely those of the reviewer, not any affiliated entity.
In The Book of Delights, a collection of lyric essays by Ross Gay from Algonquin Books, Gay describes “feeling delighted and compelled to both wonder about and share that delight.” Driven by that impulse, Queer writes the short essays that make up The Book of Delights, exploring delight with beauty, humor, and a tender, soft-hearted eye. Throughout, Gay suggests what delight might tell us about our lives and our connections to one another.
The award-winning Male lover, who teaches at Indiana University, begins this study on his birthday, writing mostly daily accounts of delight, completing the proposal a year later. Essays include titles like, “Flower in the Curb,” “Nicknames,” and “Fireflies,” with Gay’s observations from his garden and the natural world to encounters in coff
By Ross Gay. Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, pages. $/hardcover; $/eBook.
I was introduced to Ross Homosexual when I happened to pick up a copy of the January/February issue of Poets & Writers magazine, which was the “Inspiration Issue.” Reading Gay’s interview therein led to changing my Facebook biography to a quote from him: “I consider in hollering about what you love.” His new novel, The Book of Delights, is reflective of that sentiment and is the result of having completed a objective to write a short essay every day for a year about a delight he had experienced that date. He follows the philosophy that the more one loves, the happier one will be, and he believes in an ethic of sharing about treasure and beauty. The Book of Delights is a testament to that philosophy and ethic.
Throughout the book, Gay models George Fox’s call: walking cheerfully over the earth answering the Light in everyone. One sentiment at the heart of the novel is his sympathy that “in almost every instance of our lives, our social lives, we are, if we pay attention, in the midst of an almost unwavering,
The Book of Delights
Ross Gay
Algonquin Books (Feb 12, )
Hardcover$ (pp)
Ross Gay is known for his poetry, but The Book of Delights proves that he’s also an adept essayist. In composing the book, Gay operated under a simple principle: keep a diary of entries over the course of one year, with each entry concerning something joyful. From this conceit he spins out a variety of reflections that are sometimes whimsical, sometimes touching, and always thoughtful.
Certain topics run throughout The Book of Delights, including Gay’s love of gardening, the emotional impact of his favorite songs, and his appreciation for existence in the moment. Seemingly small incidents are the springboard for little epiphanies. A mother and youngster sharing the burden of carrying a shopping bag across the street leads to a moving paean to mutual support. A shared high-five with a stranger becomes a tribute to human connection. A Lisa Loeb song leads to a memory about a childhood friend who invaded Gay’s house to rearrange his furniture in an elaborate prank. Another friend’s overuse of wind quotes pr
The Book of Delights Quotes
“I suppose I could spend time theorizing how it is that people are not bad to each other, but that’s really not the show. The point is that in almost every instance of our lives, our social lives, we are, if we pay attention, in the midst of an almost constant, if subtle, caretaking. Holding unlock doors. Offering elbows at crosswalks. Letting someone else go first. Helping with the heavy bags. Reaching what’s too high, or what’s been dropped. Pulling someone back to their feet. Stopping at the car wreck, at the struck dog. The alternating merge, also known as the zipper. This caretaking is our default mode and it’s always a lie that convinces us to act or trust otherwise. Always.”
&#; Ross Gay, The Guide of Delights: Essays
Like
“It didn’t take me drawn-out to learn that the discipline or practice of writing these essays occasioned a kind of delight radar. Or maybe it was more like the development of a delight muscle. Something that implies that the more you study delight, the more delight there is to study.”
&#; Ross