Recovering Place: Reflections on Stone Hill (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780231164986)

Mark C. Taylor recounts a poignant love affair not with a person but with a place that, paradoxically, cannot be easily localized. For many years, Taylor has lived in the Berkshire Mountains, where he writes and creates land art and sculpture. In a world of mobile screens and virtual realities, where speed is the measure of success and place is disappearing, his work slows down thought and brings life back to earth to give readers time to ponder the importance of place before it slips away.

Taylor extends reflection beyond the page and returns with new insights about what is hiding in plain sight all around us. Weaving together words and images, his artful work enacts what it describes. Things long familiar suddenly appear strange, and the strange, unexpected, and unprogrammed unsettle readers in surprising ways. This timely meditation gives pause in the midst of harried lives and turns attention toward what we usually overlook: night, silence, touch, grace, ghosts, water, earth, stones, bones, idleness, infinity, slowness, and contentment. Recovering Place is a unique work with reflections that linger long after the book is closed.

Author: Mark C. Taylor
ISBN-10: 023116498X
ISBN-13: 9780231164986
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Language: English
Published: 02/25/2014
Pages: 176
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 2.05lbs
Size: 10.40h x 8.00w x 0.70d

Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 12/09/2013
Library Journal 02/15/2014 pg. 113
Foreword 05/27/2014