| November 22, 2008
Yesterday I read The Yellow Leaves, a collection of memoir pieces, essays and poems, by Frederick Buechner. I have never read any of his work before but I loved the title The Yellow Leaves and so I dove in.
The tile comes from a sonnet of Shakespeare:
That time of year thou mayst in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,
Bare ruined choirs where late the sweet birds sang.
These words reflect where Buechner finds himself now, in the latter years of life but still with yellow leaves of beauty to offer to his readers. His writing is fine, clear and simple; it is also somewhat preachy (he is an ordained Presbyterian minister) in that every story has its moral, sometimes baldly stated so that we do not miss the point of the sermon. I believe every story does have a moral, so I have no problem with Buechner’s style. I don’t know what his fiction is like but I don’t mind his straightforwardness here, in non-fiction. There is no doubt his words are genuine and his intent is clear: to share what he has seen along the way and pass on the knowledge gained. When that knowledge is the beauty that exists in small moments of life, his writing is especially sharp and true. His writing is prosaic and fair, even quite sweet at times. The poems that conclude the volume are family histories, to be cherished by his family but less moving for me.
The loveliest pieces tie together memories from all over his childhood and youth, unifying them in themes of connection and understanding and choices made and lived with. I especially liked “Presidents I have Known” which tells of his chance meetings with Presidents Roosevelt, Truman, and Eisenhower, interwoven in with the suicide of his father: “What I learned for the first time from that glimpse I had of him [FDR] in the elevator is that even the mightiest among us can’t stand on our own. Unless we have someone to hold us, our flimsy legs buckle. My father made his way down the two flights of stairs as quietly as he could, then sat on the running board and waited. When he was discovered an hour or so later that morning, he was crumpled over like Sleepy Sam.”
I also liked the essay "Fathers and Teachers". Buechner presents the various father figures he had in his life after his father died, when he was trying to find someone of authority and integrity for inspiration or solace or friendship (all those things we do get from our fathers). He was certainly lucky to have known so many good people, from his years at boarding school through college and then as a teacher and professor himself. Judging by these essays and memoirs, he was certainly a figure to inspire others, maybe even someone else who had lost too soon their own father.
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