Dakota: A Spiritual Geography (Paperback)

by Kathleen Norris (Author) "THE HIGH PLAINS, the beginning of the desert West, often act as a crucible for those who inhabit them..." (more)
Key Phrases: local history mentality, monastic people, monastic hospitality, South Dakota, North Dakota, Hope Church (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
After 20 years of living in the "Great American Outback," as Newsweek magazine once designated the Dakotas, poet Kathleen Norris (The Cloister Walk) came to understand the fascinating ways that people become metaphors for the land they inhabit. When trying to understand the polarizing contradictions that exist in the Dakotas between "hospitality and insularity, change and inertia, stability and instability.... between hope and despair, between open hearts and closed minds," Norris draws a map. "We are at the point of transition between east and west in the United States," she explains, "geographically and psychically isolated from either coast, and unlike either the Midwest or the desert west."

Like Terry Tempest Williams (Refuge), Norris understands how the boundary between inner and outer scenery begins to blur when one is fully present in the landscape of their lives. As a result, she offers the geography lesson we all longed for in school. This is a poetic, noble, and often funny (see her discussion on the foreign concept of tofu) tribute to Dakota, including its Native Americans, Benedictine monks, ministers and churchgoers, wind-weathered farmers, and all its plain folks who live such complicated and simple lives. --Gail Hudson

From Publishers Weekly
A native of South Dakota, Norris maps the cultural and spiritual landscape of life on the High Plains.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Mariner Books; Later Printing edition (September 7, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 039571091X
• ISBN-13: 978-0395710913
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (53 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,013,473 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars This is the best of Norris' works I have read, January 2, 1999

By A Customer

I had previously read two other books by Norris: The Cloister Walk and Amazing Grace:A Vocabulary of Faith. I had given copies of both to friends and family. To be honest I didn't expect Dakota to be any better than those two, but I was mistaken. Norris' descriptions of her corner of South Dakota were breathtaking and almost made me want move there. I share a similar faith journey to Norris'and I find her understanding (and lack of understanding)of God as she is learning to know him to be very believable and at times very moving. Norris has to be one of the best writers currently writing about Christianity. I would recommend this book to anyone who is looking for a closer relationship with God, and also to anyone who appreciates good writing.

31 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a beautiful, deliberate book of faith, July 3, 2003

By	Joe Sherry (Minnesota) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Dakota: A Spiritual Geography (Paperback)

Kathleen Norris is the author of Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith, and The Cloister Walk. She is a poet. Dakota was her first work of nonfiction/memoir. Having read both Amazing Grace and The Cloister Walk, I had an idea of what to expect from Norris's work. She writes deeply personal and deeply spiritual books. Dakota has the same type of feel to it, but the location and the subject is different.

Kathleen Norris's past lay in western South Dakota, but for twenty years she had abandoned both her faith as well has her history. She went to school in New York but decides to move back to Lemmon, SD with her husband. Her book is subtitled "A Spiritual Geography". She writes early on that geography comes from the words for earth and writing, and so knowing that this is a spiritual geography we immediately know that this is a spiritual discussion of the Dakotas, as well as also being about Norris herself.

Norris writes about small town life and small town church, and a semi-history of the town of Lemmon. Since most of the details are told in anecdote, it makes things easier to read. One thing that struck me was how she was comparing monastic life to small town faith and how much things tied together like that. The focus on monastic life and on monks is a theme and a topic that will run throughout the book as well as into her subsequent books. Kathleen Norris may not have a mainstream Christian faith, but she has a deep reverence and respect for the Christian tradition and faith, especially that which has come from the monasteries.

This is a slow moving, peaceful book. It is thoughtful, intelligent, and moving. It is filled to the brim with a steady faith in Christ and in some ways, it moves like time spent in a monastery. I don't know if this sounds like a recommendation, but it is meant to be. I found Dakota to be very interesting and along with Dakota, I would recommend Norris's later book: Amazing Grace.

21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars agriculture?, March 31, 2000

By A Customer

I loved this book, which I found in the AGRICULTURE section at Borders! That was a puzzler, b/c DAKOTA has nothing to say about growing plants and everything to say about people. I thought Norris's observations about small towns where people seem figuratively to stand around with their fingers in their ears, daring anyone to try to tell them anything, analogous to places of business where I've worked and other small communities, such as churches. I found the book clear-eyed, poetic, unsentimental, deeply spiritual and altogether riveting. I should add that so did our book club, people of many different tastes and experiences.