"What I Want
To know what it means to live a biblical life, uncloistered every day. This is my book of new ritual, of learning to live a prophetic life in conjunction with another....My practice is observation. How do relationships illuminate?" --Joni Tevis, "A Field Guide to Iridescence and Memory"
Two and a half weeks ago while searching for books linked to Ander Monson's Neck Deep and Other Predicaments I discovered Joni Tevis. Sadly, I'd never heard of her before. Joyfully, I found her! And now I share the glory with you.
The Wet Collection was published in 2007. This is the first essay collection that the subcategory of "lyric" doesn't annoy me. She doesn't write meaningless, annoying sentences! Her writing is not obscure or needlessly "experimental" (please excuse the scorn, I've been frustrated, I'm sure they are nice people). Tevis writes crisply. Her images border between song and dream. Her lucid thought process on the page invites you to ruminate with her. She writes honestly.
I think she's changed my life. Really.
A door opened as I read her work. (A cyclone, actually--but how does it open and yet not blur--?) Essays are the literature of thought. Revised, artful thought. Since I live in LaLa Land 70% of the time, many of my thoughts linger there. The Wet Collection allows the imagination to spin new yarns--the hypotheses and conjectures are included as essays because (duh! moment here) they are part of how she thinks. Hurray! Bring on LaLa Land and its provinces.
I don't think I've felt this liberated about my writing since I came to college four and a half years ago. Hallelujah. Praise the angel Joni.
Read her book--refreshing and rejuvenating, and not just for those in a writing slump.
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