Solitude

‘An elegant, thoughtful book . . . beautifully expresses the importance and experience of liberation from the battery-hen life of constant connection and crowds.’ Daily Mail ‘A compelling study of the subtle ways in which modern life and technologies have transformed our behaviour and sense of self.’ Times Literary Supplement In a world of social media and smartphones, true solitude has become increasingly hard to find. In this timely and important book, award-winning writer Michael Harris reveals why our hyper-connected society makes time alone more crucial than ever. He delves into the latest neuroscience to examine the way innovations like Google Maps and Facebook are eroding our ability to be by ourselves. He tells the stories of the remarkable people – from pioneering computer scientists to great nineteenth-century novelists – who managed to find solitude in the most unexpected of places. And he explores how solitude can bring clarity and creativity to each of our inner lives. Urgent, eloquent and beautifully argued, Solitude might just change the way you think about being alone. ‘Speaks to a long-overdue conversation we still haven’t properly had in our society.’ Vice ‘A timely, elegant provocation to daydream and wander.’ Nathan Filer, author of The Shock of the Fall ‘The leading thinker about technology’s corrupting influence on our collective psyche.’ Newsweek ‘A poetic, contemplative journey into the benefits of solo sojourning.’ Elle

One of the twentieth century’s enduring works, One Hundred Years of Solitude is a widely beloved and acclaimed novel known throughout the world and the ultimate achievement in a Nobel Prize–winning career. The novel tells the story of the rise and fall of the mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendía family. Rich and brilliant, it is a chronicle of life, death, and the tragicomedy of humankind. In the beautiful, ridiculous, and tawdry story of the Buendía family, one sees all of humanity, just as in the history, myths, growth, and decay of Macondo, one sees all of Latin America. Love and lust, war and revolution, riches and poverty, youth and senility, the variety of life, the endlessness of death, the search for peace and truth—these universal themes dominate the novel. Alternately reverential and comical, One Hundred Years of Solitude weaves the political, personal, and spiritual to bring a new consciousness to storytelling. Translated into dozens of languages, this stunning work is no less than an account of the history of the human race.

From Captain George Vancouver to Muriel “Curve of Time” Blanchet to Jim “Spilsbury’s Coast” Spilsbury, visitors to Desolation Sound have left behind a trail of books endowing the area with a romantic aura that helps to make it British Columbia’s most popular marine park. In this hilarious and captivating book, CBC personality Grant Lawrence adds a whole new chapter to the saga of this storied piece of BC coastline. Young Grant’s father bought a piece of land next to the park in the 1970s, just in time to encounter the gun-toting cougar lady, left-over hippies, outlaw bikers and an assortment of other characters. In those years Desolation Sound was a place where going to the neighbours’ potluck meant being met with hugs from portly naked hippies and where Russell the Hermit’s school of life (boating, fishing, and rock ’n’ roll) was Grant’s personal Enlightenment—an influence that would take him away from the coast to a life of music and journalism and eventually back again. With rock band buddies and a few cases of beer in tow, an older, cooler Grant returns to regale us with tales of “going bush,” the tempting dilemma of finding an unguarded grow-op, and his awkward struggle to convince a couple of visiting kayakers that he’s a legit CBC radio host while sporting a wild beard and body wounds and gesticulating with a machete. With plenty of laugh-out-loud humour and inspired reverence, Adventures in Solitude delights us with the unique history of a place and the growth of a young man amidst the magic of Desolation Sound.

Years after losing his lower right leg in a motorcycle crash, Robert Kull traveled to a remote island in Patagonia's coastal wilderness with equipment and supplies to live alone for a year. He sought to explore the effects of deep solitude on the body and mind and to find the spiritual answers he'd been seeking all his life. With only a cat and his thoughts as companions, he wrestled with inner storms while the wild forces of nature raged around him. The physical challenges were immense, but the struggles of mind and spirit pushed him even further. Solitude: Seeking Wisdom in Extremes is the diary of Kull's tumultuous year. Chronicling a life distilled to its essence, Solitude is also a philosophical meditation on the tensions between nature and technology, isolation and society. With humor and brutal honesty, Kull explores the pain and longing we typically avoid in our frantically busy lives as well as the peace and wonder that arise once we strip away our distractions. He describes the enormous Patagonia wilderness with poetic attention, transporting the reader directly into both his inner and outer experiences.

In Koch's Solitude, both solitude and engagement emerge as primary modes of human experience, equally essential for human completion. This work draws upon the vast corpus of literary reflections on solitude, especially Lao Tze, Sappho, Plotinus, Augustine, Petrarch, Montaigne, Goethe, Shelley, Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman and Proust. "Koch uses the work of philosophers, historians, and writers, as well as texts such as the Bible, to show what solitude is and isn't, and what being alone can do to and for the individual. Interesting for its literary scope and its conclusions about all the good true solitude can bring us." —Booklist "Reading this book is like dipping into many minds, fierce and gentle. The author reveals his long study of great philosophers, and interprets their thoughts through the lens of his own experience with solitude. He traces our early brushes with solitude and the fear it can engender, then the craving for solitude that comes with full, adult lives." —NAPRA Review

From the prize-winning author of Motherless Brooklyn, a daring, riotous, sweeping novel that spins the tale of two friends and their adventures in late 20th-century America.This is the story of two boys, Dylan Ebdus and Mingus Rude. They live in Brooklyn and are friends and neighbours; but since Dylan is white and Mingus is black, their friendship is not simple.This is the story of 1970s America, a time when the simplest decisions - what music you listen to, whether to speak to the kid in the seat next to you, whether to give up your lunch money - are laden with potential political, social and racial disaster. This is also the story of 1990s America, when nobody cared anymore.This is the story of what would happen if two teenaged boys obsessed with comic book heroes actually had superpowers: they would screw up their lives.

The poet and author’s “beautiful . . . wise and warm” journal of time spent in her New Hampshire home alone with her garden, her books, the seasons, and herself (Eugenia Thornton, Cleveland Plain Dealer). “Loneliness is the poverty of self; solitude is richness of self.” —May Sarton May Sarton’s parrot chatters away as Sarton looks out the window at the rain and contemplates returning to her “real” life—not friends, not even love, but writing. In her bravest and most revealing memoir, Sarton casts her keenly observant eye on both the interior and exterior worlds. She shares insights about everyday life in the quiet New Hampshire village of Nelson, the desire for friends, and need for solitude—both an exhilarating and terrifying state. She likens writing to “cracking open the inner world again,” which sometimes plunges her into depression. She confesses her fears, her disappointments, her unresolved angers. Sarton’s garden is her great, abiding joy, sustaining her through seasons of psychic and emotional pain. Journal of a Solitude is a moving and profound meditation on creativity, oneness with nature, and the courage it takes to be alone. Both uplifting and cathartic, it sweeps us along on Sarton’s pilgrimage inward. This ebook features an extended biography of May Sarton.