Extra: Reading from Annie Dillard's Memoir of her Childhood

Some words are better out loud--a passage about childlike joy

Click on the orange arrow in the audio player above to hear me read a selection from Annie Dillard’s memoir, “An American Childhood.”

Not Annie Dillard; me at a So Cal beach, circa 1957.

If you are a writer, you may be familiar with Annie Dillard’s book “The Writing Life.” She's also written several essay collections and a poetry volume as well-Tickets for a Prayer Wheel, along with two works of fiction. Dillard’s book on writing was my first exposure to her work and I was tickled to recently find her childhood memoir at my favorite used bookstore.

The entries in “An American Childhood” have made me laugh out loud—Dillard captures the exuberance and wonder of childhood in a remarkable way. As with many books, some of the passages are best heard rather than simply read. So here you are, me reading out loud about Joy, because some words are better out loud.

Annie Dillard bibliography—from Wikipedia

• Tickets for a Prayer Wheel (1974)

• Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (1974)

• Holy the Firm (1977)

• Teaching a Stone to Talk (1982)

• Living by Fiction (1982)

• Encounters with Chinese Writers (1984)

• The Writing Life (1989)

• The Living (1992)

• Mornings Like This (1995)

• For the Time Being (1999)

• The Maytrees (2007)

• The Abundance (2017)

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  Thursday we’ll back to our regularly-scheduled poetry posts….

  See you here then!

  Jody