Shannon's Review - A Field Guide To Getting Lost by Rebecca Solnit

Title: A Field Guide To Getting Lost

Series: None

Author: Rebecca Solnit

Genre: Non-Fiction, Essay, Philosophy

Publisher: Penguin Books

Received: Purchased

Release Date: June 2006

Pages: 209

Rating:






Author Rebecca Solnit’s Official Websites:










Website:

http://rebeccasolnit.net/




Blog:
http://rebeccasolnit.net/essays/




Facebook:
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Twitter:
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Shannon’s Thoughts:




A Field Guide To Getting Lost is the author Solnit’s personal thoughts and philosophies of how one finds their true self. She believes to find oneself you must first get lost.

There are many interesting thoughts that the author gains from nature and various other trials of life. I found by the end of the book I only found one quote I could relate to. The quote is on page 83 and is the last paragraph in the first chapter called The Blue Of Distance.

“But the changes in a butterfly’s life are not always so dramatic. The strange resonant word instar describes the stage between two successive molts, for as it grows, a caterpillar, like a snake, like Cabeza de Vaca walking across the Southwest, splits its skin again and again, each stage an instar. It remains a caterpillar as it goes skin. There are rituals marking such splits, graduations, indoctrinations, ceremonies of change, though most changes proceed without such clear and encouraging recognition. Instar implies something both celestial and ingrown, something heavenly and disastrous, and perhaps change is commonly like that, a buried star, oscillating between near and far.”

I feel my life is moving from that disastrous mode toward heavenly, oh how I wish to be that buried star.


Most of the book I could not relate to. I feel like the author Solnit, has had many experiences that I have not had, so understanding her view was difficult for me.

I read this in conjunction with the Life’s Library Book Club so it was not something I would have picked up otherwise. It was an interesting read and I would recommend to someone I think more intelligent than me. I would be interested to read something else by the author. I don’t think I could get through this one again even though I have heard you have to read it twice to get it.