The House of Belonging [Paperback]

David Whyte (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 98 pages
• Publisher: Many Rivers Press (December 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0962152439
• ISBN-13: 978-0962152436
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #36,212 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Poet David Whyte grew up with a strong, imaginative influence from his Irish mother among the hills and valleys of his father's Yorkshire. He now makes his home, with his family, in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. The author of six books of poetry and three books of prose, David Whyte holds a degree in Marine Zoology and has traveled extensively, including living and working as a naturalist guide in the Galapagos Islands and leading anthropological and natural history expeditions in the Andes, the Amazon and the Himalaya. He brings this wealth of experience to his poetry, lectures and workshops.

His life as a poet has created a readership and listenership in three normally mutually exclusive areas: the literate world of readings that most poets inhabit, the psychological and theological worlds of philosophical enquiry and the world of vocation, work and organizational leadership.

An Associate Fellow at Templeton College and Said Business School at the University of Oxford, he is one of the few poets to take his perspectives on creativity into the field of organizational development, where he works with many European, American and international companies. In spring of 2008 he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Neumann College, Pennsylvania.

In organizational settings, using poetry and thoughtful commentary, he illustrates how we can foster qualities of courage and engagement; qualities needed if we are to respond to today's call for increased creativity and adaptability in the workplace. He brings a unique and important contribution to our understanding of the nature of individual and organizational change particularly through his unique perspectives on Conversational Leadership.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

73 of 73 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Imagine Discovering Belonging, January 15, 2004

By 

Artist Barbara Garro (Barbara Garro at http://www.ElectricEnvisions.com in Saratoga Springs, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The House of Belonging (Paperback)

Experience David Whyte because David Whyte understands. That's what makes him reach me. Until I read "The House of Belonging," I never really thought about the concept. And, oh what a journey he has begun for me. I am looking back over 60 years of life and learning where I lived that was a "house of belonging" and where I lived that was not. Having lived in 30+ places, the journey is most interesting.

David encouraged me to look at the concept of belonging and showed me the importance of feeling a sense of belonging where I am in my life. I learned, like David, that a home can give you a sense of belonging even if you are the only person in it. That was a glorious revelation for someone single for 25 years.

My journey through the book bubbled forth poems, memories, aha moments, self-understandings and explorations. Wow! I am reading any David Whyte books I can get my hands on and I have read six so far.

I invite you to discover David Whyte if you have not yet read his books or heard him on his tapes and to keep on discovering him as he keeps on discovering himself.

86 of 88 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A spectacularly simple and powerful collection of poems., December 17, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (Houston, Texas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The House of Belonging (Paperback)

Whyte's "House of Belonging" represents everything that should interest today's jaded reading audience. This collection of poems is fresh, frank, and powerful, invoking a few elements of the classic American poetry tradition yet clearly establishing its own thoroughly modern style.

Whyte's images are crystal-clear and profound without being tritely symbolic. I especially liked the way he uses images from nature, almost in the style of Frost or Whitman, but still manages to make them fresh and relevant instead of merely derivative. In this "house of belonging," even simple everyday objects take on new meanings as the author examines the various elements of his life. And he doesn't waste words -- a lot of the impact of these poems comes from the simple, direct language with which he sketches his images.

The issues he deals with are issues we all understand in today's society -- particularly our need to feel a sense of belonging, of place. While there is nothing at all preachy about his work, his frank revelations of his own experience express some messages that are painfully relevant in today's world.

Whyte reveals his inner self in these lines, in a way that every reader can identify with -- almost as if they are the reader's own feelings. Take your time with these poems; they will speak to you a little differently, and a little more deeply, each time you read them.

45 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Work that lacks the murky qualities of much poetry, January 16, 2005

By 

B.A. Brittingham (Michigan, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The House of Belonging (Paperback)

We owe a debt of gratitude to David Whyte for work which lacks the obscure, murky, digressive qualities often associated with poetry and which are responsible for turning large segments of the reading public away from quality literature.

He writes with exquisite simplicity about life's monumental concerns: love, creativity, aloneness, beauty. These are the very things which, by virtue of their universality, should be easily perceptible, but which we have made endlessly complicated.

There is a pervasive, Zen-like aspect to Mr. Whyte's work. By following him back to the wild Yorkshire moors of his youth and forward to the vast potential of the land he adopted in adulthood, we are reminded to take note of each moment, to pay heed to even the most mundane articles of daily existence --- bees, trees, daisies, dishes, kettles --- because they are all facets of the ever-changing whole that is each life.

Whether dealing with the fullness of nature's many moods, or the long search for a special connection with another human being, his poems each hold at their core a lustrous pearl of truth.

He speaks to a generation now learning to accept the difficult, i.e., that not all dreams are possible but that new hopes can rise to take their place, that there is a continuance of life after what one believed to be an `only' love, and that solitude can be a genesis site for constructive activity, realization and joy.