The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating
Today I read and finished The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elizabeth Tova Bailey, having downloaded it onto my Kindle. Unsurprisingly, given the title of this blog, many people have told me about the existence of this book ever since it came out a couple of years ago.
It is beautifully presented, even on Kindle, with lots of small drawings, and I learnt a lot of interesting facts about snails. The book is mainly about how a debilitating disease causes the writer to slow down. She turns it to her advantage: as a result of her constant vigilance she was able to make an observation no one else had ever made about snail parenting skills.
Despite her predicament, the account is almost cheerful, and reading it I learnt to appreciate, once again, the value of 'the slow'.
posted by Clare Dudman at 8:02 pm
6 Comments:
Wonderfully snaily, Claire!
Strange, but one of the most joyful, optimistic people I know has been struck by both leukemia and MS... Character means so much in the face of disease.
Yes Marly, I used to hear that it was important to remain positive in the face of such adversity. Whenever I used to hear that I used to wonder how can anyone know.
Now I wonder if I was missing the point; I guess 'healing' is not just physical.
Perhaps it is the joy and optimism, but he does seem to be good at recovery... So yes, it must make a great difference, though not always enough.
Yes, the mind is a powerful tonic, I'm sure.
This is the second time I've heard about this book lately - I think I need to read it. I'm in a place where I need to learn to value and work with what I've got (aren't we all really?) and this books sounds like it's got important things to say without hard-sell self-help.
Very true, Jem. It's an inspiring, gentle book, and reminded me again how lucky I am.
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