HORIZONS OF ASTONISHING BEAUTY: BARRY LOPEZ

The Guardian

14 Mar 2019 — ‘Horizon’ is magnificent; a contemporary epic, at once pained and urgent, personal and oracular. It is being described as Lopez's “crowning achievement”.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/mar/14/horizon-by-barry-lopez-review

After publishing a much acclaimed book, it appears to be difficult to reproduce the same outcome in another publication. Arctic Dreams, (Charles Scribner's Sons, New York,1986), was read years ago, and is one of the few books of which duplicates were purchased so as to have the book in different locations - to never be without it.+  

On a recent flight via Doha on a Qatar Airways journey, Arctic Dreams turned up as an audiobook on the entertainment system. Unfortunately, it was not the whole book, just edited portions of it that had been carefully selected for their poetic expression; these extracts might be called the expressive ‘gems.’ The audiobook was a five-part series, with each section being about twenty minutes long. It was read beautifully by Kyle Soller and produced by BBC Radio 4 as a podcast that, strangely, disappointingly, is no longer available, either online or the BBC store. One wonders why?

One remembers the book by its original impact, as a text with beautiful, astute, personal observations punctuating factual reporting, pieces that recorded history, daily life, and information both descriptive and explanatory, all highlighting the extraordinary qualities of the everyday. While the whole was admirable writing, the personal pieces were always the most rich and sensitive portions of the publication with their intricate, careful observations and delicate descriptions. These formed the Qatar audiobook that was played and replayed, with each hearing revealing more and more subtlety. To listen to the audiobook was a true, inspiring delight that didn’t deserve the categorisation as ‘entertainment’ beside the usual ad hoc mix of popular music and movies.

When one later discovered the latest Lopez book, Horizon, published in 2019 by Vintage, London, the book was ordered, well anticipated, and eventually read – quickly devoured and much savoured.

The book took a similar form to that of Arctic Dreams in its parts. It was a collection of six pieces,** half a dozen stories about travels, each shaped around a particular journey that had its own unique ramifications in science, personal relations, observations, and thoughtfulness that might be labelled by a librarian as ‘ecological philosophy.’

The strange experience was how phrases, words, and ideas first revealed in Arctic Dreams, turned up here in a different but similar guise. Horizon never reaches the stunning power and clarity of Arctic Dreams, but remains a wonderful, engaging read, dancing in and out of ideas, thoughts, and observations that open up a world of wonder, a wonderful world that needs to be understood, respected and cared for. It is what one could describe as a beautiful book, so it is awkward to sound critical of a few parts.

Lopez frequently describes colours as he did in Arctic Dreams, as if this strategy had become a style, or part of the scheming of writing developed as a technique for being seen to be sensitive to wonder. He notes in one part, Shraeling Island, that he was reading Eva Figes Light, (1983/2007),# so may have been inspired by her, or inspired to continue, as Lopez appears to always record the quality of light in his observations that include the carefully noted colours and forms in the landscape that also, it seems, appear to be described as a matter of course. Have things become too formulaic?

Other ideas and expressions that recall the Arctic Dreams text are: the experience of the wild, its latent power and grandeur that raises the questions: where has it been; where is it going; what am I really seeing?, noting the point that there is a before and after any intervention that we must be aware of. Lopez again raises the matter in Horizon of how beauty amazes; and once more describes life as being ‘fearful,’ without any reference to this comment. In Arctic Dreams, he noted that the idea of living in fear was an indigenous response to his question: “What do you believe?” - “We don’t believe; we fear.” In Horizon fear is now accepted as a general way of being.

Arctic Dreams also told the beautiful story of an arctic sky being described magically as ‘the interior of an abalone shell,’ with this statement being referenced to a traveller of old; in Horizon, Lopez uses this as his description of the sky with no source identified. Have beautiful and memorable pieces remained even in the author’s imagination and memory over the years, arising again, and perhaps again, subconsciously? One can say “No” with some irony given the emotive complexities that Lopez engages with: Lopez is in total control of his expression; he knows; he can articulate and discriminate. Is this the older man reaching out, trying to touch the inspiration of youth, revisiting the remembrance of things past, a past much praised? Or might he be seeking to communicate the spirit of the ideas yet again, wanting to emphasise the observation, to maintain its descriptive authority? Sadly, repeats do not work in our era; they generally weaken the initial authority. Our era sees repetition as a boring lack of originality, ever seeking things new and different, and being quick to call out plagiarism when it so desires: see - https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2022/06/plagiarism-creativity.html. We define ownership with copyright, and see repetition as a weakness when it could be that these matters do need repeating to centre their strengths. Still, one pauses at these places in the text.

It is not as though one has studied the text critically and noted these repeats just to score points in some manner. On the contrary, many lines of the Lopez text have been recorded to use as potent quotes in the various subjects being written about at present. One recalls these few repetitions - there may be more - because of their astonishing impact when first read in Arctic Dreams. They are memorable ideas with surprising sources or intriguing encounters.

These specific repeats that pop up in the text touch on the suggestive idea of a potboiler; but Lopez is better than this. In spite of this feeling arising from the recalling of significant depictions first noted in Arctic Dreams, Horizon is much better than a hack’s publication. It is a book that holds a richness in ideas and emotion with a sincerity and commitment rarely seen in writing that is explained in the blurb on the cover as: the greatest nature/travel writer in the world. The work is engaging, in parts stunning; Arctic Dreams is really an impossible act to follow, even after after 33 years, with the work shaped by the same man, the same eyes, the same hands, the same intentions, with greater experience. Why should ideas vary when things are seen and considered with such honest rigour? Why should Lopez not confirm his stance, thus making it more important with this emphasis?

One wonders: did Lopez know this book, Horizon, published 2019, would be his last? Lopez died on 25th Dec 2020, aged 75 - see the Lopez obituary: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/26/obituaries/barry-lopez-dead.html. Lopez will be missed, but his writings will live on. One hopes that the very world of progress of which he was so critical - social tyrants lingers as a description, just as walking in a missed stair-step fashion in a blizzard does - does not stride on with its bolshie rudeness rooted in self-interest to claim attention for things quirky, new, and different as it demeans and abuses everything else. Arctic Dreams, (1986), might appear ‘old fashioned’ in time, old news, with the “We’ve moved on over 38 years with internet and astonishing strides in technology and knowledge” - and our blunt certainty.

Lopez noted how self was nothing in this world: . . . that the world acquiesces before strong men is delusional. The world outside the self is indifferent to the fate of the self. (Horizon, p.484).

Here one recalls Ananda Coomaraswamy’s writing on traditional art, that noted how personal expression was a deformation, a perversion, rather than an expression of bespoke genius. Here one can sense the greatness of otherness that we ignore in our self-centred, arrogant times that Lopez sought to diffuse and change with his expressions of beauty, wanting us to just look around. It is a world that he describes in Arctic Dreams as being: so beautiful it would make you cry . . . so beautiful, it would make you afraid; expressions repeated in Horizon without any attribution. The words were first spoken by a colleague.

Martin Lings wrote about this phenomenon in relation to Islamic art, as being something about which one could not marvel enough. This is Lopez’s subject that remains with us today as a lingering enigma that we ignore to our own detriment.

Some contemporary art, art that is not about itself or about the artist, offers perspectives that conceivably could release us from the daily tyranny of depressing news, from the meretriciousness of decisions that commit us to the inevitability of environmental catastrophe.

(Horizon, p.160)

#

The book, Horizon, has revealed Eva Figes Light, a publication praised not only by Lopez, but by John Berger too: it is another must-read. It was ordered immediately and read after Horizon was finished. As one reads it, one walks through the sunny garden, into the house, along the verandah, and, of course, around Monet’s lily pond. No one ever tells anyone that the garden and the pond are separated by a highway - see: https://voussoirs,blogspot.com MONET'S GARDEN, HOUSE, HIGHWAY & LILY POND - SEEING IS BELIEVING (21 February 2015).* Prompted by Figes’ descriptive images, one can ignore this fact, envisage Giverny, and retrace the day visit, with thoughts stimulated by the experience of being there, as well as those gained by seeing Monet’s paintings over the years. Place has never been so carefully observed and recorded in this short novel, as the experience of space, time, and light. One can understand why Lopez loved the book which he shared with his Arctic colleagues who were studying light.

Figes’ book is initially disappointing in one way as it skims fuzzily over life maybe just too lightly, but one slowly develops a regard for this text which is gentle and observant, both of light and human experience. Figes does not get carried away with Monet; she engages in the experience of all household members, adults and children, and guests, describing the most unexpected experiences with a remarkable awareness; e.g. the child being observed by an adult; and many more simple occasions of everyday engagement and response that have been shrewdly recorded. It is this authority with subtlety that envelopes the reader and enhances one’s understanding and perception of Monet’s inspiration, giving it subtle substance with a diaphanous depth. Little wonder that the book is so admired by Lopez and Berger, both of whom engage in seeing the world in this way, but differently, exposing the wonder, spirit, and intrigue inherent all life.

*

Puzzlingly, a Google search will not recognise this blog. It is as if one is not allowed to point out that there is a highway between Monet’s garden and his pond. The aerial view makes it clear.

Aerial view of Monet's garden, house, highway and lily pond.

The pond or 'water garden' is accessed from the bottom left-hand corner of the main garden area under the highway.

The D5 highway Google Earth.

The proximity of the highway challenges the visions of peace and serenity

promoted by the selected images of the paintings and photographs.

NOTE: The blog can be searched by the date in the Blog Archive.

+

The other books include:

Fiona McCarthy Eric Gill Faber & Faber, London, 2011

Kenneth White Open World: Collected Poems 1960–2000 Edinburgh: Polygon, 2003

Ian Tait Shetland Vernacular Buildings 1600-2000 The Shetland Times, 2012

Kathleen Raine William Blake Longmans, Green, London, 1951/65/69

Keith Critchlow Islamic Patterns, Thames and Hudson, London, 1976.

**

The six collected pieces are:

CAPE FOULWEATHER

SHRAELING ISLAND

PUERTO AYORA

JACKAL CAMP

PORT ARTHUR TO BOTANY BAY

GRAVES NUNATAKS TO PORT FAMINE ROAD