kellysmaust's review against another edition
2.0
Choosing to live and be alone is a super interesting topic, discussion of which is in short supply these days. It's a great idea for a book, but the author seemed to also be choosing solitude from an editor as he went on and on without really going anywhere or concluding anything.
bard4lyfe's review against another edition
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
fast-paced
5.0
Every once in a while a book finds you, rather than you finding it. This is that book. It either finds you or you buy it and find it useless. In any other part of my life this book would have had no effect. I do not believe in fate or destiny but this is by far an eerie calculus of probability. So, I hope this book finds you rather than you finding it. Cheers.
aarikdanielsen's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
3.75
loloreid's review against another edition
emotional
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
A beautiful and personal reflection on solitude not as pathology or antisocial dismissal of human connection but as a joyful calling that can be experienced in support of creative development and connection. Using his own experience and history to ground the discussions Johnson presents a variety of examples of historical creative figures to consider approaches that may have unfolded counter to societal norms or expectations but were honest expressions of personality and creative practice that led to personal and artistic vibrancy. Each chapter focuses and responds to a different creative figure, including Paul Cezanne, Walt Whitman, Zora Neale Hurston, Emily Dickinson. Johnson leaves the reader with the possibility of an expansion of social interaction and relationship dynamic that skillfully avoids a sense of defensiveness or rebellion that is joyful and inspiring.
we_are_all_mad_here26's review against another edition
2.0
What I wanted from this book was a pleasant discussion of solitude: what it is, what it's good for, why we (or some of us) love it, how we can find more of it. And so on.
Which is not what I got from this book. Not necessarily because it wasn't there, but because my mind went completely blank by the end of sentences like this one:
I've read that at least forty to fifty times and I still am not quite sure what it says.
Which is not what I got from this book. Not necessarily because it wasn't there, but because my mind went completely blank by the end of sentences like this one:
"And - with full and necessary and sorrowful acknowledgment of institutionalized religion's evils, horrors, and omissions - perhaps the exploded and fragmented nature of the contemporary developed world owes itself to the insistence of institutionalized religion and science alike that we subscribe to doctrine and dogma in service to their aggrandizement, instead of attending to the need to bring us together to acknowledge all that is sacred, in ourselves and in our world."
I've read that at least forty to fifty times and I still am not quite sure what it says.
jumbleread's review against another edition
5.0
Lovely and wise essays about solitude. Useful for thinking about how to think about shelter at home during the pandemic.
valariesmith's review against another edition
5.0
A few years ago, I read two acclaimed books about silence and about forests from the same author (not, to be clear, Fenton Johnson). I found them both almost unreadable because they were so academic, containing endless chatter of facts and interviews and research, while providing no sense of the joy or tranquility that either silence or the forests evoke.
At the Center of All Beauty finally gives me the celebration of solitude that I so longed for in the other books. It isn't simply about how nice it is to be alone - it's about how being alone, for some of us, supports our own self-awareness and individual expression which, in turn, helps us enlarge our capacity to love and encourages us to be better friends and citizens.
But this book is so much more than that. As another reviewer said, it's hard to believe this book wasn't written specifically about, or for, me. The stories of his family and childhood home in Kentucky particularly moved me because it so paralleled my own (a large, extended, working class family, who I loved deeply but moved far away from, and the specific, inexhaustible grief of a childhood home recently gone). In this exquisite book about achieving the non-self, I found myself on every beautiful page.
I also wonder if there's a specific sense of solitude felt by those of us raised in working class families, but living in white collar worlds. I feel like some of us live with a continual feeling of being within and without, never quite at home with either group.
Thank you, Fenton Johnson, for cultivating beauty, fostering connections and reminding me how I fit in as one small part of a much larger whole.
At the Center of All Beauty finally gives me the celebration of solitude that I so longed for in the other books. It isn't simply about how nice it is to be alone - it's about how being alone, for some of us, supports our own self-awareness and individual expression which, in turn, helps us enlarge our capacity to love and encourages us to be better friends and citizens.
But this book is so much more than that. As another reviewer said, it's hard to believe this book wasn't written specifically about, or for, me. The stories of his family and childhood home in Kentucky particularly moved me because it so paralleled my own (a large, extended, working class family, who I loved deeply but moved far away from, and the specific, inexhaustible grief of a childhood home recently gone). In this exquisite book about achieving the non-self, I found myself on every beautiful page.
I also wonder if there's a specific sense of solitude felt by those of us raised in working class families, but living in white collar worlds. I feel like some of us live with a continual feeling of being within and without, never quite at home with either group.
Thank you, Fenton Johnson, for cultivating beauty, fostering connections and reminding me how I fit in as one small part of a much larger whole.
pcdbigfoot's review against another edition
4.0
Since first reading Mr Johnson's work years ago, I've really enjoyed his voice. Full of inspired examples of artists drawing on their innermost selves for great work, the author speaks of solitude as presence rather than absence. I'll contemplate this one for a while.