This summer I've read several amusing and thought-provoking books by writers-turned-farmers. Although the stories share a common underlying theme (a big-city author who wants to escape the madness and become more self-sufficient), each tale has its own unique twist. After finishing a few books in this modern-day homesteading genre, I realized that the writer-turned-farmer condition is not, in fact, novel (pardon the pun) but an archetype. After all, over 150 years ago, Henry David Thoreau built his cabin on Walden Pond and began a two-year attempt to eliminate the luxuries that "are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind." It somehow is both comforting and dismaying that one's pursuit of the simple life in 1845 is just as relevant in 2009. Recommended books by writers-turned-farmers:
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver; Made from Scratch by Jenna Woginrich; Farewell My Subaru by Doug Fine; Goat Song by Brad Kessler; Farm City by Novella Carpenter; Hit by a Farm by Catherine Friend; Coop by Michael Perry; Fifty Acres and a Poodle, by Jeanne Marie Laskas
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