Customer Reviews

Meditations from a Movable Chair

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To enter the world of another mind is to discover we are all of one mind. Andre Dubus makes this possible by minding the business of living. Each grief, loss, and puzzlement he experiences is faced full on, letting us see how the prosaic details speak larger meanings when veiwed from the perspective of faith: life has meaning when I accept as a gift what I don't understand.

Although he always wrote pencil to paper, I do not think he would object to a tribute on the net.

Andre Dubus was my friend. I attended his wake, funeral and "time" this past weekend. We were buddies that shared a common living space...the campus of Bradford College. He lived in a townhouse out back, I was the dorm director for Academy Hall.. We went to the Red Sox together, we walked down the placid evening summer street to Ronnie D's on more than one occasion...oh, the tranquil nights, the botanical paradise where we stopped to sniff the lucious bushes and trees and shrubs that Dick Broadhurst had taught us to appreciate...

My heart is broken, I cannot imagine Andre not walking this planet, I cannot do without the wisdom and grace that made ME important because he was my friend.

The funeral, a simple Catholic mass, was missing the most important ingredient...I remember the many occasions when Andre was elected to be the speaker, to put our grief into eloquent words... Carolina Arria, the beautiful flower of Argentina was remembered as a cara mia...Jim Valhouli, the man who emphasized Andre's grace was his treaure...Tony DeLuca the frog sandwich...no one escaped his discerning eye.

I sit here and weep at 5"00 a.m. not knowing how to put this behind me. As a member of alcoholics anonimous Iam taught to let go and let god... why is it so difficult for me and the hundreds of people at that church who wept as Rebecca Paris sang "The Lush Life" to let go?

We are all a product of his munificence...I will write a letter to the kids and his beautiful sisters that I know they will understand...I will contribute to the Homeless Shelter for veterans because my husband is a Vietnam combat Marine who persuaded Andre to don his Combat Cover one wonderful night last November...

Andre, I miss deep sea fishing with you...the drive past Brown's (full of penanace)...the revolution and moratorium...the fish you brought over to Inge's house that night...we were little devils and then you reformed.

Hail Mary, full of Grace...now and at the hour of our death...

I wish this was not so spontaneous, you deserve a more fitting tribute.

Excelsior Andre! Love, Mary P.

P.S. I encourage the friends and admirers of Andre to write and comfort me, to share their thoughts and keep the church going. MJPCRP@aol.com

Shortly after finishing "Meditations from a Moveable Chair," I learned that Andre Dubus recently had died. I was surprisingly startled, considering he was a man I never knew and with whose writing I was merely acquainted. My reaction to the news of his death speaks a great deal about the quality and affect of Dubus's austere and confessional prose. Dubus frequently ends essays in the volume by recalling the moment of the piece's composition, as if he is offering not only an artifice, but the origin, the spot of time and emotion and weather from which the artifice emerged. In some cases this device seems almost redundant because his clean prose seemed already imbued with the sense of being written; especially in the essays recounting manual labor, jogging, or taking churchyard laps in his wheelchair, I imagined a man (resembling the man with a pensive scowl on the book's jacket) hammering away at a typewriter. Despite being about many quotidian things, Dubus's writing reminds me of a few lines of "Song of Myself": "Not words of routine this song of mine, / But abruptly to question, to leap beyond yet nearer bring." Although at times I thought Dubus was simply repeating himself, well, simply, I found the essays to be touching, memorable, and a pleasure to read. "Meditations from a Moveable Chair" is markedly anti-stoic: beneath its equivocal title, the volume effuses the pleasures and pain of life after a literal "wreck of body," and offers itself to its reader as a sacrifice and another one of Dubus's sacraments.

All over the world we should keep praying for the repose of Andre Dubus's soul, for he prayed so hard for the repose of ours. This book, and any of the others, is for the reader tired of glitz but unwilling to be dishonest. Do you believe in poetry after Auschwitz? How about the Eucharist after Columbine? If these are hard questions, read Andre Dubus. He had no easy answers, no quick fixes. Nor did he whine and celebrate postmodern angst while complacently tenured in an MFA program. God but we needed him!

Many of these pieces have appeared in different places and they are worth reading all at once. If you have not read Andre Dubus, put down your Wally Lamb and run to your nearest bookstore. If you read Andre, you will not be dissapointed.

His writing has a compassion and thoughtfulness that is lost in a lot of writing. The sentiment and hopefulness is always hovering there amidst trying times. The question "how did things get this bad" is always overshadowed with "how did things once so bad change or deepen us?"

He is quite frankly the most important writer alive. (Sorry Phillip Roth) He is someone who knows not and writes not of corporate sponsorship, the Internet, and spin doctors. He concentrates on people, hopeful and desparate people. Dream-seeking people. In-person, non-virtual people.

13 years ago, in 1987, I met Mr. Dubus at Charles Hotel, Boston. I was 27 years old and stayed at Bradford College as an international student. After coming back home, I approached several publishers to issue Mr. Dubus' excellent books in Japanese. In 1992, I could accomplish to publish his beatiful novellas and stories in three books. I was so happy to introduce his work for Japanese readers. Mr. Dubus was happy too, and wrote to me about his impressions.

Time has gone.

I heard the news of his death just two days ago. Beyond grief, I'm going to read deeply this book and translate from English to Japanese, and then introduce his works to Japanese readers more, certainly.

I would like to visit Haverhill at the anniversary of his death. I pray for the repose of Mr. Dubus' soul.

We have sadly lost a great writer. "Giving Up the Gun," from this collection, is an unspeakably beautiful piece of writing, like much of what's found in this book (saving "Sacraments"). After reading one of Dubus's chapters, I found I didn't plow headlong into the next story, but slowly closed the book and looked up and around my world with heightened senses and a flood of longing. He really was remarkable.

Andre Dubus prsents us with his most intimate thoughts about life and intimate relationships. He bares all, and, in doing so, creates a medium for communication with the the most inner emotions in us all. By writing of his fear, his anger and frustration, his inability to express deep felt emotions, he touches base with men,in particular, who share similar feelings; feelings that are often kept within oneself, but beg to be spoken of. This collection of essays is also a tribute to one mans's struggles with his faith in God and in his own humanity as he struggles with life's tragic events. Dubus shows us, by writing of his personal tragedies, that despite all we are survivors. We continue through life because we are continously in the process of becoming and are capable, if we permit it, of redefining ourselves as we or life demand it.

Andre and I were in the Writer's Workshop at the University of Iowa at the same time. We lived on Brown Street, neighbors and friends. I noted his dedication, his sincerity, his love of language. Those qualitites continued to grow in his writing over the years. He produced some amazing works. I mourn his death and and applaud his writing. I recommend it to anyone seeking excellence in the written word. Douglas Kent Hall

"Meditations on a Movable Chair" is a great work of creative nonfiction. Dubus' thoughts resonate by the pure honesty in which they are presented. He gives us glimpses of his life that are important to him. And we see a man; not very unlike ourselves, who is struggling with a life lived in body, soul, and spirit. The result of this baring of truth: a slow, steady, and warm beauty that is Dubus' very own soul. We begin to see something beautiful in the brokenness of man. We begin to see that not everything is broken. There is life: and Dubus fights fort this life and meditates on this life for us.

I recommend a slow - meditative - reading of this book to fully enjoy its beauty.