I just finished Orbital by Samantha Harvey. The story is a day in the life of six astronauts on the International Space Station. It’s fiction, doesn’t have a plot per se, and is one of the most beautiful books I’ve ever read. Someone recommended it to me and I resisted it at first, thinking outer space wasn’t my cup of tea, but it’s so human, so beautiful. When I read it, I always came away feeling weightless & dreamy, as though I had just meditated.
The Land is Full, Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects describes projects where the fullness of time inscribed in the soil, the geology and topography, and the culture-- all play out in how these landscape architects shape the experience of places. An essay in the book by Robert Pogue Harrison says that visiting Memorial Park in Houston relieved what he calls his "anthropogenic depression, a pessimism," which he surmises we all share. Also reading a biography of Frederick Douglass to know what courage looked like in another time. For escape I look at shoes and don't buy them....thank you, Natalie, for everything.
Wow! I love your deep dive. Thank you, for letting me know. I'm going to look up "anthropogenic depression." Oddly, the novel I mention has two architects as characters though their work is not really mentioned. A Luis Barragán staircase is mentioned. And, having just been to Diego Rivera's studio I could picture it in my mind. xN
I just finished Orbital by Samantha Harvey. The story is a day in the life of six astronauts on the International Space Station. It’s fiction, doesn’t have a plot per se, and is one of the most beautiful books I’ve ever read. Someone recommended it to me and I resisted it at first, thinking outer space wasn’t my cup of tea, but it’s so human, so beautiful. When I read it, I always came away feeling weightless & dreamy, as though I had just meditated.
On my nightstand! TBR! xN
This touched so close to a moment in my own life, it shut me down.
The Land is Full, Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects describes projects where the fullness of time inscribed in the soil, the geology and topography, and the culture-- all play out in how these landscape architects shape the experience of places. An essay in the book by Robert Pogue Harrison says that visiting Memorial Park in Houston relieved what he calls his "anthropogenic depression, a pessimism," which he surmises we all share. Also reading a biography of Frederick Douglass to know what courage looked like in another time. For escape I look at shoes and don't buy them....thank you, Natalie, for everything.
Wow! I love your deep dive. Thank you, for letting me know. I'm going to look up "anthropogenic depression." Oddly, the novel I mention has two architects as characters though their work is not really mentioned. A Luis Barragán staircase is mentioned. And, having just been to Diego Rivera's studio I could picture it in my mind. xN