Northwest writers explore their region
9 One of the most profound
thinkers on the subject of
regionalism — a concept that can
be extended to include a regional
approach to literature — also
happens to be a native of the
Northwest.
The poet Gary Snyder has
argued for years that writers must
work consciously to develop a
“sense of place" in their lives
and in their writing. Snyder's
definition of a sense of place
means the writer tries to
“correlate the overlap between
ranges of certain types of flora,
between certain types of biomes,
and climatological areas, and
cultural areas, and get a sense of
that region ”
In a 1971 interview with
Richard Grossinger, Snyder says,
"All these are exercises toward
breaking our minds out of the
molds of political boundaries or
any kind of habituated or
received notions of regional
distinctions.”
One of the benefits of breaking
these mental boundaries to
develop a sense of place, Snyder
says in a 1979 interview with
Michael Helm, is the one that
relates to literature:
“by being in place, we get
the largest sense of community
We learn that community is of
spiritual benefit and of health for
everyone, that on-going working
relationships and shared
concerns, music, poetry, and
stories all evoive into the shared
practice of a set of values,
visions, and quests.”
Of course, Snyder’s view isn’t
entirely new. Many major writers
— such as William Faulkner in the
South or Willa Cather in the
Midwest — have worked from an
intimate awareness of their own
region.
The peculiarities of the
Northwest — by comparison a
recently settled region —
currently are being explored by a
variety of good writers. The work
of those represented here is
barely a start.
See Page 4B.