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Unceremoniously dumped in the orphanage by their drunken, war-traumatized father, Don and his brother Mike learn the harsh realities of life. We can feel the fear of the tormented child and smell the antiseptic dormitory. Not all is bad there, for it is during this time that the young Donald sees his true love, Annette, for the first time. Her brunette hair, twinkling eyes and heart-melting smile are what help sustain the warrior's sanity and focus during some of his darkest moments, which are yet to come. Don was a 'malcontent renegade' in the eyes of the nuns, because he fought for his dignity and that of his brother. Recalcitrant, yet gregarious, Don is dismissed from the orphanage with h...
A companion volume to The Oxford Book of Literary Anecdotes, this volume covers the whole range of American literary history from the 17th century to the present. Taken from biographies, letters, memoirs, and table-talk, the stories form an irreverent history of American literature.
The revered American Poet Laureate reflects on the meaning of work, solitude, and love with “extraordinary nobility and wisdom” (The New York Times) When Donald Hall moved to his grandparents’ New Hampshire farm in 1975, his work as a writer and a life devoted to the literary arts must have seemed remote from the harsh physical labor of his ancestors. However, he reveals a similar kind of artistry in the lives of his grandparents, Kate and Wesley. From them, he learned that the devotion to craft—be it canning vegetables, writing poems, or carting manure—creates its own special discipline and an ‘absorbedness’ that no wage can compensate. In this “sustained meditation on work as the key to personal happiness” (Los Angeles Times), we see how the writer has modeled his own life on his family’s lives of work, solitude, and love. When Hall comes face to face with his own mortality halfway through writing this book, we understand both his obsession with work and its ultimate consolation.
In these tender essays, Hall shares his memories and thoughts on growing up in New Hampshire on his grandparent's dairy farm, of the seasons, and of his connection to the land, his family, and his coming home.
A former poet laureate presents a new collection of essays delivering an unexpected view from the vantage point of very old age.
Offers a collection of short stories, including "Christmas Snow," "Keat's Birthday," and "The Figure of the Woods"
100 years that crafted an iconic American company A century ago, the Halls were a poverty-stricken family trying to make their way in a small Nebraska town. Today, they are a golden example of a family that has created a groundbreaking company. Hallmark: A Century of Caring is the inspirational story of an American dream brought to life through hard work, strong values, and a genuine care for both employees and customers. Beginning with a heartfelt introduction from famed poet Maya Angelou, the reader is taken on a journey that follows the Hall family from Norfolk, Nebraska, to Kansas City, Missouri, the eventual home of Hallmark. Through boom times, war times, and the Great Depression, the company grew and flourished, always with the belief that its products and services must enrich people's lives. One hundred years after Joyce Hall first stepped off of the train in Kansas City, Hallmark is poised and ready for the future. This book is an enduring salute to the company and a historic journal of a truly iconic American company.
Hall's bestselling collection ever speaks of the death of his wife--his gift and testimony, his lament, and his celebration of loss and love.
An anthology of American poems, is arranged chronologically, from colonial alphabet rhymes to Native American cradle songs to contemporary poems. 50 illustrations, 20 in color.
"These vivid New Hampshire farm sketches from Hall's well-spent youth--all written when he was full-grown--are as much attuned to the supple and enticing utilities of language as they are grounded in a vanished time which may, at a glimpse, seem simple, but were complex and rich and not simple at all."--Richard Ford This is a collection of story-essays diverse in subject but united by the limitless affection the author holds for the land and the people of New England. Donald Hall tells about life on a small farm where, as a boy, he spent summers with his grandparents. Gradually the boy grows to be a young man, sees his grandparents aging, the farm become marginal, and finally, the cows sold and the barn abandoned. But these are more than nostalgic memories, for in the measured and tender prose of each episode are signs of the end of things: a childhood, perhaps a culture. In an Epilogue written for this edition, Donald Hall describes his return to the farm twenty-five years later, to live the rest of his life in the house that held a box of string too short to be saved.