The Years of the Forest. Helen Hoover.

The Years of the Forest
Helen Hoover
Pen-and-Ink Drawings by Adrian Hoover
New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
1973

Why read it? Reminiscent of Thoreau, Wife and husband, writer and illustrator, live in the Minnesota woods. It was not a vacation. The conditions were primitive. But she and her husband were able to be independent, to work out their destiny without being dependent on anyone. They had to make their own decisions. They knew the animals with whom they had a close relationship as individuals, not just as wildlife. They learned to live with nature, not to control it.

Some sample ideas from the book:
Death: "I lay there as much under the control of natural forces as a tree in a gale. If my fighting power was the stronger, I would recover, as the tree might stand against the wind. If I was not, I would become part of the earth from which I came. Whether I went back to the earth the next day or on a day ten thousand days ahead was something I could not control, and so should not think about. A week later, when I woke feeling hungry, I knew that I had gained an understanding and acceptance of death, and of the natural laws that govern the extent of life. The circumstances that opened my mind to this came from our isolation, but the knowledge came from the forest, where the transience of animals, plants, even the shapes of the rocks, is a constant reminder of the impermanence of all forms of mortality, and the steady renewal of life and growth affirms the unity and timelessness of the source of all things known to men."

True love. The story of Mr. and Mrs. Twit, two injured juncos. When Mr. Twit was able to fly with the other birds, he did so. The Hoovers cared for Mrs. Twit with her injured wing over the winter. When spring came, the juncos returned, but one bird stayed apart--Mr. Twit. Mrs. Twit joyously joined him and they flew away together.

Freedom from Civilization. "Not learning of disasters about which we could do nothing and that we might never have heard of, even in a city, in days of less far-reaching communications, left our minds free to plan our work and to think our way to a better understanding of both earth and man."

Hunger. A starving deer steps out of the forest. A friend names him Peter Whitetail. "In the morning he staggered through a savagely cold wind to our doorstep and ate most of what would have been our next meal from the Christmas-dinner-leftovers. Then he begged for more, with head bobbing and hoof tapping on the step, and I gave him ground carrots that he liked so well they brought a twitch to his ear and a sparkle to his eye. From that day, we felt that his coming was part of some plan we could not yet know."

Man and His Environment. "...ecology, which deals with the mutual relations of living beings and of the relations between them and their environment. To us the efforts of man to 'conquer nature' and so prove himself greater than the unity of which he is a part or superior to the forces that created him, seem not only dangerous and presumptuous, but stupid and silly."

Telling Temperature: "I had already learned how to tell temperature by the feel of snow under my boots--soft and compressible around twenty degrees, crunching at zero, squeaking at ten to twenty below, crackling like small firecrackers at thirty below and colder. "

Cruelty. "No wild animal is cruel because the word implies consciousness of inflicting mental or physical pain. Predators feed as instinct directs, and their killing is guiltless. Only man has the power to understand what he is doing, and so only man can be cruel."

Quote: Credo. "First, we had not thought we were any more important than the flora and fauna around us; second, we had tried to leave as little trace of our passing over the earth's surface as was possible...." "I knew that I had found what all men seek--my place in the world of my time."