Böcker av Sam Pickering

A fresh collection of humorous and often satirical essays by Sam Pickering, who keeps telling us it's his last book!

Sweeping in and out of real and imagined places, Dreamtime highlights the curious character of an unconventional teacher, writer, traveler, husband, and father as he takes stock of his multifaceted life. Sam Pickering-the inspiration for the main character in Dead Poets Society-guides us on a journey through his reflections on retirement, aging, gardening, and travel. He describes the pleasures of domesticity, summers spent in Nova Scotia, and the joy of sharing a simple life with his wife of almost forty years. "e;Life is a tiresome journey,"e; Pickering muses, "e;and when a man arrives at the end, he is generally out of breath."e; Although Pickering is now more likely to shuffle than gallop, he isn't yet out of breath, ideas, or ink. The refreshing and reflective substance of these essays shines through a patina of wit in Pickering's characteristically evocative and sincere prose. The separate events depicted in Dreamtime invite the reader into Pickering's personal experiences as well as into his viewpoints on teaching and encounters with former students. In "e;Spring Pruning,"e; Pickering describes the precarious tumor in his parathyroid and the possibility of cancer affecting his daily life. In a refreshingly honest tone Pickering says, "e;Moreover the funeral had become a staple of chat, so much so I'd recently mulled having the raucous, insolent ringer on my telephone replaced by the recording of taps."e;Appealing to creative writers and readers who enjoy an adventurous account of travels through life, Dreamtime accentuates the lifestyle of a longtime master teacher whose experiences take him from sunny days in the classroom to falling headfirst over a fence after running a half-marathon. Unpredictable, spontaneous, and always enlightening, Pickering's idiosyncratic approach and companionable charm will delight anyone who shares his intoxication with all the surprising treasures that might furnish a life with happiness.

He roams New England, Arkansas, the Caribbean, Nova Scotia and the familiar and odd plots of mind and thought. He explores shorelines and climbs "hillish" mountains. He sits on porches and talks to passersby and their dogs. He meets strange and delightful people, most of whom are real. "Reading Pickering," a reviewer wrote in The Smithsonian decades ago, "is like taking a walk with your oldest, wittiest friend." "Now," Pickering says, "I am old, and the friends who thought me witty have fallen off the perch. But that's okay. What I write makes me smile and mutter, 'What a guy.'" And what wonderful essays these are-pages that awaken the affections and make readers smile and embrace the beauty of this bruised world.

Presents a collection of familiar essays. The author comes from the generation in which girls read books about horses, and boys, about dogs, and his prose is old-fashioned and marvellously clear. He is a meanderer, and Parade's End celebrates the passing drift of days and the quiet miracles of living.

Presents a collection of familiar essays in which Sam Pickering explores libraries and woods and fields. He wanders over hills and far away - to the Caribbean and Canada - but he always returns to the local, to Connecticut and his memories of a Southern childhood. He ponders writing and aging, joy and lunacy. He celebrates family and Christmas. He laughs and tells terrible lies, and jokes.

The essays in Sam Pickering's new collection sing with thoughtful observations on life, death, love, and literature. Whether attending a reunion at Sewanee, cruising the Caribbean, wandering the streets of Storrs, Connecticut, or rambling through Nova Scotia, Pickering is able to work a quotation, insight, or reminiscence into almost every page.

"No one creates so many memorable, saucy aphorisms-piquant, bitter-sweet, arousing." -Pat C. Hoy II, New York University Sam Pickering's essays are funny and wise-and always intoxicating, eggnog to warm glazed winter nights and juleps to cool sweltering summer days. He wanders Connecticut, Canada, and the South, seeding his old farm in Nova Scotia with words and scattering paragraphs in and about classrooms at the University of Connecticut. He describes the great flowerings of summers and falls. He mulls over vanishing friendships, then hunts for buried treasure in a library. He endures a massage, ponders the genteel, and explores shadowy alcoves and books. For him home is where heart and heartache thrive together. Students make him laugh and weep, and in part his book is a teaching manual crammed with anecdotal good sense. He buries his old dog George and picks up Bert, a rescue dachshund addicted to unmentionable munchies and cloddish doggy behavior, an animal who obstinately refuses to cross the Rainbow Bridge. Pickering runs road races, although he says anyone in a motorized walker could leave him far behind. In "Premortem" he anatomizes his vanishing muscles and then decides to have a knee operation in hopes of shuffling fast enough to keep a heeltap ahead of the pale rider on the white horse. This is a book about love and happiness-a restorative collection that shows readers how to enjoy life's small glories even among its indignities. When the going gets sour, Pickering tells a joke and transforms the sour into sweet delight. Sam Pickering teaches English at the University of Connecticut. The inspiration for the teacher in the movie Dead Poets Society, Pickering is a member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers and a master of the essay form. Among his dozen collections of essays are A Little Fling and The Last Book, both published by the University of Tennessee Press.

Describing the early years of his childhood, the author reveals what made him a successful teacher and writer.

In this, his tenth book of essays, renowned raconteur Sam Pickering wanders from Nova Scotia to Tennessee, from a middle school athletic field to an English department. He tells stories about people named Googoo and Loppie. He examines trees and flowers. He watches a daughter play soccer and a son row.

Sam Pickering spends six months roaming Australia and New Zealand, tramping landscapes pocked by sheep stations, art galleries and bakeries, and always libraries, their dusty shelves troves quick with life and literature.