The Work of Edie Clark
|
My BooksStates of Grace: Encounters with Real YankeesThe new book is here and ready to be shipped to you. This is what appears on the back cover of States of Grace:
Here are some of the most delightful, eccentric, honest-to-God Yankees you'll ever meet. New England's most beloved columnist, Edie Clark, paints each of their portraits with the soul of a poet and the warm heart of a friend. Once you read this unforgettable book, you'll feel they're your friends, too. --Sy Montgomery, author of Birdology and The Good Good Pig To read Edie Clark’s profiles is to enter into the truest New England. She meets people with her heart open, and, thus, a vast array of characters open theirs. You will not forget the people you meet in these pages. And you will understand why Edie Clark has long been the writer Yankee’s readers feel is a part of their family. -- Mel Allen, Editor, Yankee magazine In these pages, meet: • A woman who’d never made a quilt before but who dreamed a pattern one night and spent the next six months stitching together her dream pattern, the first of many she has created entirely by hand and then has given away, with love. • A man who took photographs of his hometown, Hartford, Ct., for most of his life using a Brownie reflex camera and creating what amounted to a complete architectural history of his beloved city. The photos are now in the permanent collection at the Hartford Public Library. • A man who, in 1935, bought a house and five acres of hayfield in central Maine and promised his wife they would someday have “gardens we can walk through.” Both of them are gone now but his extensive gardens have been saved as a national treasure that thousands walk through each summer. • A Rhode Island man who conquered his retirement boredom by creating an entire miniature village out of discarded aluminum cans. The village (every house is furnished inside) is now in a museum of historic preservation in Newport. • An eighty-eight-year-old lobsterwoman and shepherdess who kept her sheep on an island and her heart in a lighthouse. • A man in love with grass • The oldest newspaper columnist on earth Of these people, Clark says in her introduction: “(these are) all ostensibly ordinary people but who had one central passion that drove their lives. Eventually, I realized that they were, each of them, living in a state of grace: there was one deep and abiding passion at the center of their lives which endowed them with an elegance and guided them with generosity and good will.” Each story, many of which were originally published in Yankee magazine, is augmented with an update. If you would like to order a copy of this book, click the link to the left or make out a check to Edie Clark for $23.95 ($19.95 + $4 s+h) and send to PO Box 112, Dublin NH 03444. The Place He MadeThe new edition of The Place He Made is available. The book, originally published in both hardcover and paperback, was declared out of print in 1999 but people have never stopped writing to me in search of this book. Based on this continued interest, I've produced a re-issue of the book and written an afterword which expresses some of what happened as a result of this book. I never expected the kind of response that came when the book was published. Apparently there is a need for books that speak honestly about the experience of losing the battle to cancer as well as the experience of losing a spouse when your lives are still young. It is nearly twenty years since Paul's death yet his special way of being continues to inspire me and encourage me. What has surprised me most is that his special way of being has also inspired others through this book. I never quite realized the extraordinary power of the printed word until The Place He Made was published. The entire experience has taught me a great deal about loss and about grief. Ordering information is on the left of this page.
Saturday Beans and Sunday Suppers: Kitchen Stories from Mary's FarmLife-saving iced tea, Indian pudding “as it should be,” dandelion wine made in the days when flowers meant peace, roast lamb on an Icelandic farm, baked beans from those who know best, cod cheeks and ale, and a trip to spring that ends with a meal of shad, asparagus and rhubarb pie. Take this journey from the early 1960s all the way to the present and visit all kinds of kitchens on the way through the decades. In Saturday Beans and Sunday Suppers, you’ll discover a delicious collection of thoughts, memories and recipes, all about food, written by one of New England’s most treasured writers. Here, food is not just sustenance but life and spirit and communion all in one. Guaranteed to inspire an appetite, for life and for good food, happily prepared.
224 pages, softcover, $14.95 plus $4 s+h ($18.95 total).
|
Selected WorksArticles
In 1992, the Bishop of Worcester condemned St. Joseph's Catholic Church and ordered it closed. The parishioners refused to leave, sleeping on cots and on the hard pews. For thirteen months this was their life. In July of 1993, they were removed by the police. In many ways this was the blossoming of their faith.
Originally published in Yankee Magazine in November 1993.
Growing up, nothing I could do seemed to please my mother and nothing she said made sense to me. But when my mother, on the threshold of death, came to live with me, I found what seemed to have been lost forever.
Originally published in Yankee Magazine, May 1995
(The follow-up article to Miracle at St. Joseph's.)
The Bishop turned to them and said, "Your prayers have been answered, the hard hearts have softened."
Originally published in Yankee Magazine, December 1996
A reflection on the power of cooking and friendship and the concept of family.
Originally published in Yankee Magazine, November/December 2007
Memorial Day, Harrisville, New Hampshire
1995
Originally published in Yankee Magazine, May 1996
My Articles
Libraries occupy a special place in the heart of a town. Evening events at the library give a strong sense of community and make it seem like a great place to live. And in the wake of the online revolution small town libraries have found a way to not only survive but to be indispensable.
In December 2008 an epic ice storm left virtually the entire state of New Hampshire without power. The residual effects of that storm paralyzed the Monadnock Region almost through Christmas. A first person account.
In 1994, sixteen-year-old Billy Best was diagnosed with Hodgkin's Disease. After several treatments, he ran away to avoid chemotherapy. What happened after that may have been a miracle.
Roxanne Quimby once lived primitively in the Maine woods. Today she owns 90,000 acres of those woods, and her goal is to create a national park to preserve the landscape forever. So why do so many people wish she'd just go away?
Multi-million dollar border stations are rising along our line between US and Canada. What was once the "friendliest border" has become deadly serious.
Personal experience with Lyme Disease
Renowned short story writer, Andre Dubus, reflects on the accident that cost him his legs.
A trip to Poland discovers a beloved family friend
An elegy for the master of the short story.
Fall comes to The County
Thousands seek healing from this innocent, comatose child.
A complete listing of articles published since 1978
Fiction
An encounter with a sick fox brings a young woman to the heart of her grief
Books in Progress
A book about my parents. |
