DAVID WHYTE MANY RIVERS Winter Spring 2021
Letter from the House Events with David Whyte New from Many Rivers David Recommends Friends and Family Walking Tours Letter from the House Living Without Enemies Refusing to Name as the Essence of Kindness I know the truth give up all other truths No need for people anywhere on earth to struggle Look it is evening look it is nearly night what do you speak of poets lovers generals The wind is level now the earth is wet with dew the storm of stars in the sky will turn to quiet And soon all of us will sleep beneath the earth we who never let each other sleep above it Marina Tsvetaeva trans Elaine Feinstein Outside the kitchen window veils of rain and wind are bringing in the autumn weather from far across the Pacific On the animated satellite map glowing from my laptop the earth looks gorgeous hues of blue and green and corrugated brown appearing and disappearing under spiraling patterns of rain and cloud Those same great spirals of rain and wind have made their way from the subtropics of the Philippines or the Northern islands of Japan finally turning to a white that signifies snow as they cross the Cascade mountains and sweep inland across the American continent Beneath all this magnificence it is sobering to think humankind has decided it might allow itself to be bullied into tiny dead end conversations where we are made to turn into one another s adversaries Indeed we have been bullied into bullying one another by our own technologies and by unbridled political money not only into forgetting the miraculous nature of life that sustains us all but into hating one another over nothings spun into somethings that turn us into mutual enemies I don t often say this out loud but even though I consider myself a deeply religious person in an unnameable elemental sense I often find a person s Cover photo Tree Borrowdale David Whyte
Letter from the House Events with David Whyte New from Many Rivers David Recommends Friends and Family Walking Tours Letter from the House Living Without Enemies Refusing to Name as the Essence of Kindness I know the truth give up all other truths No need for people anywhere on earth to struggle Look it is evening look it is nearly night what do you speak of poets lovers generals The wind is level now the earth is wet with dew the storm of stars in the sky will turn to quiet And soon all of us will sleep beneath the earth we who never let each other sleep above it Marina Tsvetaeva trans Elaine Feinstein Outside the kitchen window veils of rain and wind are bringing in the autumn weather from far across the Pacific On the animated satellite map glowing from my laptop the earth looks gorgeous hues of blue and green and corrugated brown appearing and disappearing under spiraling patterns of rain and cloud Those same great spirals of rain and wind have made their way from the subtropics of the Philippines or the Northern islands of Japan finally turning to a white that signifies snow as they cross the Cascade mountains and sweep inland across the American continent Beneath all this magnificence it is sobering to think humankind has decided it might allow itself to be bullied into tiny dead end conversations where we are made to turn into one another s adversaries Indeed we have been bullied into bullying one another by our own technologies and by unbridled political money not only into forgetting the miraculous nature of life that sustains us all but into hating one another over nothings spun into somethings that turn us into mutual enemies I don t often say this out loud but even though I consider myself a deeply religious person in an unnameable elemental sense I often find a person s Cover photo Tree Borrowdale David Whyte
Letter from the House 2 declaration of specific religious or political beliefs the most tedious uninteresting thing I could ever know about them Uncompromising religious or political beliefs are almost always a declaration of where we have stopped paying attention where we refuse to have a conversation and where we want to manipulate others into our way of thinking It is impossible for a human being to simultaneously have all the answers and pay real attention to anything other than their own manufactured thoughts it is almost impossible to be kind when carrying fixed beliefs It is especially impossible to be vulnerable and because all conversation ends when vulnerability ends it can be almost impossible to hold a real conversation And that is probably as much true for me in regard to the activist left as the conservative right no matter how righteous the cause Most specifically when the person lacks that timeless abiding diagnostic of true religious or political experience a deep and abiding kindness for others We actually live in a time characterized by a deep and abiding distrust of strangers and an unmerciful unkindness to those who do not fit our ideas on the left and the right Evangelical Christians may be deeply unkind to those who do not share their beliefs but politically correct University campuses can be just as unmerciful in a very Old Testament way casting out demons into the intellectual wilderness Strangely enough this distrust and unkindness toward others creates a symmetry of distrust inside the distruster themselves who must always meet the next version of themselves in the form of someone they probably would not agree with therefore distrusting any new thoughts dawning even inside themselves distrusting most tellingly the part of them courageous enough generous enough and I might say in today s world kind enough to live without easy answers From a scientific point of view all of our surrounding reality is conversational that is nothing can exist without meeting or cooperating or exchanging elemental nourishment with something else Our present times and ever present technologies have made worse a very ancient human failing the Letter from the House 3 willingness to make up stories when we do not understand things fully and most tellingly to become afraid of where that understanding might lead Whether we lived hundreds of years ago in a tissue of contradictory religious beliefs or thousands of years ago under broad unknowing skies from which the gods seemed to descend to punish us whether we live now in Silicon Valley or struggle to get by in a corrugated shanty on the far edge of Cape Town individual human beings have always had to and still must find their way through a fog of stories that other people want us to believe These stories have always taken semi ridiculous forms which everyone is then made to believe and made normal by the powerful the rich and the influential strange religious superstitions fraudulent religious leaders power mad politicians and most sadly of all all of those once original and precious authentic religious revelations now turned into manipulative mis information by those who wish to profit by our confusion Confusion may be one of the great hallmarks of human history but so is misinformation We have always collectively and individually since the dawn of conscious time been seriously misinformed either scientifically or psychologically or religiously most especially misinformed as to what really contributes to our happiness and where the limits of our knowledge lie The only thing we can be sure of and this truth is now being crystalized by the crazily self magnifying power of the internet is that human beings have a foundational difficulty in having any real conversation with the unknown With or without an internet they are always supplying easy answers too early in the process before they ever have the experience the understanding or even the right to know what is actually happening From a collective point of view this dynamic grants an evolutionary advantage of course as a portion of any given population will at least have got the possibilities right ahead of time by mere chance thus ensuring survival of the species as a whole but it is has disastrous consequences from the point of view of individual human happiness Our foundational difficulty is that we human beings find it difficult to live with what cannot be yet understood with what we are powerless to under
Letter from the House 2 declaration of specific religious or political beliefs the most tedious uninteresting thing I could ever know about them Uncompromising religious or political beliefs are almost always a declaration of where we have stopped paying attention where we refuse to have a conversation and where we want to manipulate others into our way of thinking It is impossible for a human being to simultaneously have all the answers and pay real attention to anything other than their own manufactured thoughts it is almost impossible to be kind when carrying fixed beliefs It is especially impossible to be vulnerable and because all conversation ends when vulnerability ends it can be almost impossible to hold a real conversation And that is probably as much true for me in regard to the activist left as the conservative right no matter how righteous the cause Most specifically when the person lacks that timeless abiding diagnostic of true religious or political experience a deep and abiding kindness for others We actually live in a time characterized by a deep and abiding distrust of strangers and an unmerciful unkindness to those who do not fit our ideas on the left and the right Evangelical Christians may be deeply unkind to those who do not share their beliefs but politically correct University campuses can be just as unmerciful in a very Old Testament way casting out demons into the intellectual wilderness Strangely enough this distrust and unkindness toward others creates a symmetry of distrust inside the distruster themselves who must always meet the next version of themselves in the form of someone they probably would not agree with therefore distrusting any new thoughts dawning even inside themselves distrusting most tellingly the part of them courageous enough generous enough and I might say in today s world kind enough to live without easy answers From a scientific point of view all of our surrounding reality is conversational that is nothing can exist without meeting or cooperating or exchanging elemental nourishment with something else Our present times and ever present technologies have made worse a very ancient human failing the Letter from the House 3 willingness to make up stories when we do not understand things fully and most tellingly to become afraid of where that understanding might lead Whether we lived hundreds of years ago in a tissue of contradictory religious beliefs or thousands of years ago under broad unknowing skies from which the gods seemed to descend to punish us whether we live now in Silicon Valley or struggle to get by in a corrugated shanty on the far edge of Cape Town individual human beings have always had to and still must find their way through a fog of stories that other people want us to believe These stories have always taken semi ridiculous forms which everyone is then made to believe and made normal by the powerful the rich and the influential strange religious superstitions fraudulent religious leaders power mad politicians and most sadly of all all of those once original and precious authentic religious revelations now turned into manipulative mis information by those who wish to profit by our confusion Confusion may be one of the great hallmarks of human history but so is misinformation We have always collectively and individually since the dawn of conscious time been seriously misinformed either scientifically or psychologically or religiously most especially misinformed as to what really contributes to our happiness and where the limits of our knowledge lie The only thing we can be sure of and this truth is now being crystalized by the crazily self magnifying power of the internet is that human beings have a foundational difficulty in having any real conversation with the unknown With or without an internet they are always supplying easy answers too early in the process before they ever have the experience the understanding or even the right to know what is actually happening From a collective point of view this dynamic grants an evolutionary advantage of course as a portion of any given population will at least have got the possibilities right ahead of time by mere chance thus ensuring survival of the species as a whole but it is has disastrous consequences from the point of view of individual human happiness Our foundational difficulty is that we human beings find it difficult to live with what cannot be yet understood with what we are powerless to under
Letter from the House 4 stand or name Therefore we will believe in all kinds of wild notions and nonsense so long as we can proclaim that we believe in something or anything at all especially if we can form a tribe around that fictitious something most especially if we can advertise through those beliefs turn the advertising into dogma and then coerce and defraud the other members of that newly gathered tribe out of their money or their integrity Thankfully deep in the inherited understanding of all of our great contemplative and artistic traditions deep in the original religious revelations that always seem to morph so strangely into religious or political priests in black gowns walking about the place there lies an understanding of where true happiness lies both individually and collectively Happiness and the kindness that arises from happiness lies in paying profound attention to people and things other than ourselves This attention leads to rest and most particularly to resting into the breath which is the essential and tidal give and take of our physical essence This living breathing sense of rest allows everything else to rest into itself the mist wreathing at the forest s edge the way a spade lifts black soil the way bread rises or a daughter s face breaks into a smile even the comforting noise a laptop might make when it glows into the wan morning light With regard to other people happiness lies not in forcing others to believe what we believe but in attempting to believe the unbelievable essence of another human being s spirit and equally the spirit of the natural world with which they co inhabit To see the essence of another is to see the way they are made to shape the world and the way they are made for the world to shape them even if they cannot see it themselves without naming without label but through a kind of attention which by itself is a kind of encouragement It is the gift of being able to have that other person or that created world speak back to us in their own voices unmediated by our agreement or whether we think they are right or wrong Happiness comes from an unmediated unmanipulated and many times unnameable appreciation that is born and flowers from profound attention It is difficult to understand because it is so foundational to our hearing and Letter from the House 5 seeing and thankfully unprocessed by our strategic minds As T S Eliot said it is a condition of complete simplicity costing not less than everything What it costs is the giving up our illusory control over others by naming and labeling in a marriage in a community in the secret conversations we have with our own mysterious self in the mirror To stop seeing ourselves and others as this or that Right Wing or Liberals or Christians or Atheists as strugglers or as winners in a way that makes us fearful and distant What we gain is at first a puzzlement at not having easy answers a puzzlement which turns slowly into beautiful questions that begin to transform us from the inside out We navigate a temporary sense of disturbance at not being able to relate to people through judgment followed by a sense of silence and space in which other people can move without our monitoring their every move we allow ourselves to breathe and as we rest into the miracle of breathing easily we can let others breathe too This is not political naivety we can still make our choices at the ballot box out of this silence and spaciousness there is still a place for a temporary righteous anger at injustices and a wish to work toward their end We simply mediate our identity through a deep a priori state of attention rather than temporary judgments we allow change through paying attention an attention that stays with the heart of the matter and the heart of those whom we are addressing that looks to drink from a deeper well and understand what lies underneath what is being said This world has always been a very fierce place in which to live for individual human beings The stakes have always been very high both from a psychological and a physical point of view you can mistake someone else s life as your own you can mistake someone else s religion as your own particularly if you have grown with it Most seriously you can mistake someone else s anger and hatred as your own You can be hoodwinked by those who would gain from your anger your money and your time into feeling you are surrounded by enemies It is time for each of us to claim our life back through a deeper more wordless attention to this world we have been gifted to inhabit and to cultivate a deep
Letter from the House 4 stand or name Therefore we will believe in all kinds of wild notions and nonsense so long as we can proclaim that we believe in something or anything at all especially if we can form a tribe around that fictitious something most especially if we can advertise through those beliefs turn the advertising into dogma and then coerce and defraud the other members of that newly gathered tribe out of their money or their integrity Thankfully deep in the inherited understanding of all of our great contemplative and artistic traditions deep in the original religious revelations that always seem to morph so strangely into religious or political priests in black gowns walking about the place there lies an understanding of where true happiness lies both individually and collectively Happiness and the kindness that arises from happiness lies in paying profound attention to people and things other than ourselves This attention leads to rest and most particularly to resting into the breath which is the essential and tidal give and take of our physical essence This living breathing sense of rest allows everything else to rest into itself the mist wreathing at the forest s edge the way a spade lifts black soil the way bread rises or a daughter s face breaks into a smile even the comforting noise a laptop might make when it glows into the wan morning light With regard to other people happiness lies not in forcing others to believe what we believe but in attempting to believe the unbelievable essence of another human being s spirit and equally the spirit of the natural world with which they co inhabit To see the essence of another is to see the way they are made to shape the world and the way they are made for the world to shape them even if they cannot see it themselves without naming without label but through a kind of attention which by itself is a kind of encouragement It is the gift of being able to have that other person or that created world speak back to us in their own voices unmediated by our agreement or whether we think they are right or wrong Happiness comes from an unmediated unmanipulated and many times unnameable appreciation that is born and flowers from profound attention It is difficult to understand because it is so foundational to our hearing and Letter from the House 5 seeing and thankfully unprocessed by our strategic minds As T S Eliot said it is a condition of complete simplicity costing not less than everything What it costs is the giving up our illusory control over others by naming and labeling in a marriage in a community in the secret conversations we have with our own mysterious self in the mirror To stop seeing ourselves and others as this or that Right Wing or Liberals or Christians or Atheists as strugglers or as winners in a way that makes us fearful and distant What we gain is at first a puzzlement at not having easy answers a puzzlement which turns slowly into beautiful questions that begin to transform us from the inside out We navigate a temporary sense of disturbance at not being able to relate to people through judgment followed by a sense of silence and space in which other people can move without our monitoring their every move we allow ourselves to breathe and as we rest into the miracle of breathing easily we can let others breathe too This is not political naivety we can still make our choices at the ballot box out of this silence and spaciousness there is still a place for a temporary righteous anger at injustices and a wish to work toward their end We simply mediate our identity through a deep a priori state of attention rather than temporary judgments we allow change through paying attention an attention that stays with the heart of the matter and the heart of those whom we are addressing that looks to drink from a deeper well and understand what lies underneath what is being said This world has always been a very fierce place in which to live for individual human beings The stakes have always been very high both from a psychological and a physical point of view you can mistake someone else s life as your own you can mistake someone else s religion as your own particularly if you have grown with it Most seriously you can mistake someone else s anger and hatred as your own You can be hoodwinked by those who would gain from your anger your money and your time into feeling you are surrounded by enemies It is time for each of us to claim our life back through a deeper more wordless attention to this world we have been gifted to inhabit and to cultivate a deep
events with DAVID WHYTE Letter from the House 6 form of attention to those who inhabit it with us an appreciation which might be the essence of kindness itself We are always larger grander more deserving than the names we have given ourselves or that we have allowed others to put upon us We all of us always deserve a daily experience of the nameless and the timeless because in that timeless domain we find both rest and true animation and a possibility of a true name emerging to catch us off guard with its sudden truth In its bountiful sense of presence that place where we do not name things too early when carried inside us out into the world can be relied upon like a good friend to come back and name us every day in ever kinder and more merciful ways SUNDAY DECEMBER 13th 10am PT REGISTER A GIFT IN ITS SEASON THE SEVEN VULNERABILITIES OF GIVING This 75 minute session will look appropriately enough for the holiday season at the art and practice of gift giving and the art of getting the gift right both for ourselves and for the recipient I will look at giving as a kind of art form and something that must be practiced where we must risk giving too much or too little or as we have all experienced the wrong thing altogether This understanding applies not only to tangible gifts to others but also the way we give our creative gifts to the world Our life like a breath then a give and a take a bridge a central movement between singing a separate self and learning to be selfless David Whyte from A Seeming Stillness in ESSENTIALS NEW SUNDAY SERIES JANUARY 10th 17th 24th REGISTER START CLOSE IN RESOLUTIONS FOR A NEW YEAR S JOURNEY Join David Whyte for Three Sundays in January to look at the phenomenon of giving up in order to go on of finding new promises by letting go of old ones and remembering those vows that seemed to have been made on our behalf at our birth
events with DAVID WHYTE Letter from the House 6 form of attention to those who inhabit it with us an appreciation which might be the essence of kindness itself We are always larger grander more deserving than the names we have given ourselves or that we have allowed others to put upon us We all of us always deserve a daily experience of the nameless and the timeless because in that timeless domain we find both rest and true animation and a possibility of a true name emerging to catch us off guard with its sudden truth In its bountiful sense of presence that place where we do not name things too early when carried inside us out into the world can be relied upon like a good friend to come back and name us every day in ever kinder and more merciful ways SUNDAY DECEMBER 13th 10am PT REGISTER A GIFT IN ITS SEASON THE SEVEN VULNERABILITIES OF GIVING This 75 minute session will look appropriately enough for the holiday season at the art and practice of gift giving and the art of getting the gift right both for ourselves and for the recipient I will look at giving as a kind of art form and something that must be practiced where we must risk giving too much or too little or as we have all experienced the wrong thing altogether This understanding applies not only to tangible gifts to others but also the way we give our creative gifts to the world Our life like a breath then a give and a take a bridge a central movement between singing a separate self and learning to be selfless David Whyte from A Seeming Stillness in ESSENTIALS NEW SUNDAY SERIES JANUARY 10th 17th 24th REGISTER START CLOSE IN RESOLUTIONS FOR A NEW YEAR S JOURNEY Join David Whyte for Three Sundays in January to look at the phenomenon of giving up in order to go on of finding new promises by letting go of old ones and remembering those vows that seemed to have been made on our behalf at our birth
New from MANY RIVERS REVISED EDITION of CONSOLATIONS Includes an introduction by Maria Popova and one new essay ART PRINT FROM THE PERPETUA PRESS created by David s friend and acclaimed book designer Edward Wates Printed in the traditional method from the original wood engraving and raised metal type HILARY PAYNTER is one of the United Kingdom s leading wood engravers and past president of the Royal Society of Painter Printmakers 15 x 20 5 Each print is signed by the artists Hilary Paynter and David Whyte 95 PURCHASE Consolations arose out of an almost instinctual need to write while traveling it seemed to appear organically out of fleeting thoughts made real through writing in trains on boats and planes in hotel lobbies on mountainsides and in cafes all over this wide world The book made its own mark in the world and somehow has sold over a hundred thousand copies After a good few years of revising the essays through posting and commenting on many of them online this second edition is I feel a sharper version It has one new essay added which has become one of my favourites called Close To consciously become close is a courageous form of unilateral disarmament a chancing of our arm and our love a willingness to hazard our affections and an unconscious declaration that we might be equal to the inevitable loss that the vulnerability of being close will bring Available exclusively from davidwhyte com PURCHASE THE PERPETUA PRESS was established by Vivian Ridler and David Bland in 1931 In 2020 it was taken over by David s close friend Edward Wates a book designer and lettering artist whose work has been widely exhibited and is included in a number of international collections AUDIOBOOK available on Audible Listen to these beautiful essays as they were meant to be heard read by David Whyte PURCHASE
New from MANY RIVERS REVISED EDITION of CONSOLATIONS Includes an introduction by Maria Popova and one new essay ART PRINT FROM THE PERPETUA PRESS created by David s friend and acclaimed book designer Edward Wates Printed in the traditional method from the original wood engraving and raised metal type HILARY PAYNTER is one of the United Kingdom s leading wood engravers and past president of the Royal Society of Painter Printmakers 15 x 20 5 Each print is signed by the artists Hilary Paynter and David Whyte 95 PURCHASE Consolations arose out of an almost instinctual need to write while traveling it seemed to appear organically out of fleeting thoughts made real through writing in trains on boats and planes in hotel lobbies on mountainsides and in cafes all over this wide world The book made its own mark in the world and somehow has sold over a hundred thousand copies After a good few years of revising the essays through posting and commenting on many of them online this second edition is I feel a sharper version It has one new essay added which has become one of my favourites called Close To consciously become close is a courageous form of unilateral disarmament a chancing of our arm and our love a willingness to hazard our affections and an unconscious declaration that we might be equal to the inevitable loss that the vulnerability of being close will bring Available exclusively from davidwhyte com PURCHASE THE PERPETUA PRESS was established by Vivian Ridler and David Bland in 1931 In 2020 it was taken over by David s close friend Edward Wates a book designer and lettering artist whose work has been widely exhibited and is included in a number of international collections AUDIOBOOK available on Audible Listen to these beautiful essays as they were meant to be heard read by David Whyte PURCHASE
Featured David Recommends SPECIAL EDITIONS I am in the midst of reading or have read five very different books recently These handcrafted limited editions of The House of Belonging and The Bell and the Blackbird are a joy to hold to read and most especially for me to sign The fine covers are embossed with lettering designed by my stone carver friend John Nielsen at his hillside cottage just over the Welsh Border from England there is a colour illustration of the orginal cover design inside and a ribbon page marker Made to endure to admire and above all to read The Prelude William Wordsworth Newly Edited from the Manuscripts and fully Illustrated in Colour A magnificent labour of love on the part of the editors of Wordsworth s magnum opus and perhaps my desert island choice for a large inexhaustible read through the timeless voice of poetry Mad Bad and Dangerous to Know The Fathers of Wilde Yeats and Joyce by Colm Tobin Tobin had me from the very first paragraphs of his introduction as he walks around literary Dublin invoking the ghostly residences and ports of call of the authors fathers A foundation for beginning to understand how each seemingly independent writer s talents were inextricably linked to their fathers inheritance for good and bad Come with me now along the beckoning path silvered in mist toward the glimmering lake bring every grief you have not said and every tear you have not shed This is the bright home in which I live this is where I ask my friends to come this is where I want to love all the things it has taken me so long to learn to love PURCHASE PURCHASE The Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante Beginning with the first book in this quartet My Brilliant Friend I have just begun this odyssey of fierce friendship and heartbreak and I can tell already that I am in for a very wild and at times very harrowing ride into the future of two girls growing into the post war world of Naples Provence 1970 M F K Fisher Julia Child James Beard and the Reinvention of American Taste Something a little different to feed my love of cooking food and all the inherited cuisines of the world The book circles around a pivotal dinner held in Provence and the lives of the influential cooks and food writers who gathered at the table Most especially it follows the life of MFK Fisher a fascinating figure who influenced many of the approaches we now take for granted in food writing A very evocative read and very well done
Featured David Recommends SPECIAL EDITIONS I am in the midst of reading or have read five very different books recently These handcrafted limited editions of The House of Belonging and The Bell and the Blackbird are a joy to hold to read and most especially for me to sign The fine covers are embossed with lettering designed by my stone carver friend John Nielsen at his hillside cottage just over the Welsh Border from England there is a colour illustration of the orginal cover design inside and a ribbon page marker Made to endure to admire and above all to read The Prelude William Wordsworth Newly Edited from the Manuscripts and fully Illustrated in Colour A magnificent labour of love on the part of the editors of Wordsworth s magnum opus and perhaps my desert island choice for a large inexhaustible read through the timeless voice of poetry Mad Bad and Dangerous to Know The Fathers of Wilde Yeats and Joyce by Colm Tobin Tobin had me from the very first paragraphs of his introduction as he walks around literary Dublin invoking the ghostly residences and ports of call of the authors fathers A foundation for beginning to understand how each seemingly independent writer s talents were inextricably linked to their fathers inheritance for good and bad Come with me now along the beckoning path silvered in mist toward the glimmering lake bring every grief you have not said and every tear you have not shed This is the bright home in which I live this is where I ask my friends to come this is where I want to love all the things it has taken me so long to learn to love PURCHASE PURCHASE The Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante Beginning with the first book in this quartet My Brilliant Friend I have just begun this odyssey of fierce friendship and heartbreak and I can tell already that I am in for a very wild and at times very harrowing ride into the future of two girls growing into the post war world of Naples Provence 1970 M F K Fisher Julia Child James Beard and the Reinvention of American Taste Something a little different to feed my love of cooking food and all the inherited cuisines of the world The book circles around a pivotal dinner held in Provence and the lives of the influential cooks and food writers who gathered at the table Most especially it follows the life of MFK Fisher a fascinating figure who influenced many of the approaches we now take for granted in food writing A very evocative read and very well done
Early Music by M che l S illeabh in Instrumental compositions by Troy Chapman inspired by CONSOLATIONS I am so proud of becoming a publisher and giving a young poet a chance to show his work to the world particularly with M che l who I have known and nurtured for many years as he has grown into his artistry I delve into the book at least once a week to see how he is getting on and I would say in my humble opinion he is doing very well indeed at the beginning of his poetic life with his eye and his voice and his inviatations to a very fine quality of insight When David asked me to compose music to accompany the audiobook version of his best selling book Consolations I knew it had to be personal and evocative yet also conversational I set out to create a score of sorts for the insights and imagery that resonate throughout the essays Friends and Family If you ve joined us on David s walking tour in Italy you ve experienced the grace and culinary expertise of Lori De Mori and Laura Jackson proprietors of the Towpath Caf a place of extraordinary hospitality on Regent s Canal in London Filled with stories recipes and inviting photographs TOWPATH reflects the hearts and talents of two remarkable people committed to feeding body and spirit LEARN MORE LISTEN Instruments featured include lute baroque guitar Uzbek rabab resonator guitars and ukuleles a soulful odyssey of stringed instruments EARLY MUSIC illuminates deep themes of human experience with a profound unwavering eye With chapters titled Admonition Love Belief Water and Myth the poems display a true virtuoso s ear for rhythm and language leading the reader through joyful mythical and surprising landscapes PURCHASE Often times the step backward lets the soul catch up So that all our happy hindsights harmonise and wisdom builds from Turas d Anam
Early Music by M che l S illeabh in Instrumental compositions by Troy Chapman inspired by CONSOLATIONS I am so proud of becoming a publisher and giving a young poet a chance to show his work to the world particularly with M che l who I have known and nurtured for many years as he has grown into his artistry I delve into the book at least once a week to see how he is getting on and I would say in my humble opinion he is doing very well indeed at the beginning of his poetic life with his eye and his voice and his inviatations to a very fine quality of insight When David asked me to compose music to accompany the audiobook version of his best selling book Consolations I knew it had to be personal and evocative yet also conversational I set out to create a score of sorts for the insights and imagery that resonate throughout the essays Friends and Family If you ve joined us on David s walking tour in Italy you ve experienced the grace and culinary expertise of Lori De Mori and Laura Jackson proprietors of the Towpath Caf a place of extraordinary hospitality on Regent s Canal in London Filled with stories recipes and inviting photographs TOWPATH reflects the hearts and talents of two remarkable people committed to feeding body and spirit LEARN MORE LISTEN Instruments featured include lute baroque guitar Uzbek rabab resonator guitars and ukuleles a soulful odyssey of stringed instruments EARLY MUSIC illuminates deep themes of human experience with a profound unwavering eye With chapters titled Admonition Love Belief Water and Myth the poems display a true virtuoso s ear for rhythm and language leading the reader through joyful mythical and surprising landscapes PURCHASE Often times the step backward lets the soul catch up So that all our happy hindsights harmonise and wisdom builds from Turas d Anam
Walking Tours In a fit of optimism I have decided to act as if it might be possible to roam out into the world again in the latter half of next year and run a few tours It is hard to contemplate another year without the fresh Atlantic breeze in my hair or hear the pipes wending their unstoppable way through the sea air of County Clare I thirst most thirstily for a pint of Guinness in Margaret s Bar in Ballyvaughan I long to return to forest temples of Japan and I pine for the back roads of Tuscany calling me to their pilgrim ways But most of all I am interested to see what this person who has enjoyed staying at home so much makes of the wide world once he is let loose again And I look forward most heartily to whoever joins me All the refund policies are very generous taking into account the possibilities for an extended bout of Covid ALL TOUR DETAILS THE HILLS OF TUSCANY SEPTEMBER 7th 14th 2021 From the first evening standing on the threshold of an ancient Etruscan tomb with the light slanting across the stone imagining centuries of mothers fathers and children making their lives amongst the olive groves to the closing night s celebration under the stars the week in Italy is a moveable feast both literally and imaginatively a true celebration of the senses a shaping of the mind and the body through walking seeing listening and tasting WEST OF IRELAND JUNE 12th 19th 2021 NAKASENDO TRAIL JAPAN NOVEMBER 4th 11th 2021 David s tour to the west of Ireland is a celebration of Ireland s Celtic culture both traditional and emerging set on Galway Bay in County Clare The tour offers an intimate experience of Ireland from the inside out with morning poetry sessions setting the stage for afternoon walking pilgrimages You will have the opportunity to hear world class musicians and experience why County Clare is renowned for carrying the soul of traditional Irish music Join David Whyte and Gayle Karen Whyte for this mountain and forest trail through the landscapes and villages of central Japan walking in the footsteps of Japan s most famous poet Basho Our tour begins in Kyoto followed by train into the mountains Once on the trail we will stay at traditional Ryokan Inns bathing in their hot springs by night and by day walking past temples and shrines along forest paths and through tiny hamlets David will work with themes of the moment with Gayle adding to the content and facilitation
Walking Tours In a fit of optimism I have decided to act as if it might be possible to roam out into the world again in the latter half of next year and run a few tours It is hard to contemplate another year without the fresh Atlantic breeze in my hair or hear the pipes wending their unstoppable way through the sea air of County Clare I thirst most thirstily for a pint of Guinness in Margaret s Bar in Ballyvaughan I long to return to forest temples of Japan and I pine for the back roads of Tuscany calling me to their pilgrim ways But most of all I am interested to see what this person who has enjoyed staying at home so much makes of the wide world once he is let loose again And I look forward most heartily to whoever joins me All the refund policies are very generous taking into account the possibilities for an extended bout of Covid ALL TOUR DETAILS THE HILLS OF TUSCANY SEPTEMBER 7th 14th 2021 From the first evening standing on the threshold of an ancient Etruscan tomb with the light slanting across the stone imagining centuries of mothers fathers and children making their lives amongst the olive groves to the closing night s celebration under the stars the week in Italy is a moveable feast both literally and imaginatively a true celebration of the senses a shaping of the mind and the body through walking seeing listening and tasting WEST OF IRELAND JUNE 12th 19th 2021 NAKASENDO TRAIL JAPAN NOVEMBER 4th 11th 2021 David s tour to the west of Ireland is a celebration of Ireland s Celtic culture both traditional and emerging set on Galway Bay in County Clare The tour offers an intimate experience of Ireland from the inside out with morning poetry sessions setting the stage for afternoon walking pilgrimages You will have the opportunity to hear world class musicians and experience why County Clare is renowned for carrying the soul of traditional Irish music Join David Whyte and Gayle Karen Whyte for this mountain and forest trail through the landscapes and villages of central Japan walking in the footsteps of Japan s most famous poet Basho Our tour begins in Kyoto followed by train into the mountains Once on the trail we will stay at traditional Ryokan Inns bathing in their hot springs by night and by day walking past temples and shrines along forest paths and through tiny hamlets David will work with themes of the moment with Gayle adding to the content and facilitation
