★★★★★ 5
A beautifully crafted invitation to journal
Format: Paperback
Lilias Trotter Legacy’s latest book Beholdings is not so much a text as it is a beautifully crafted invitation. Inspired by the journals and sketches of Lilias Trotter (1853-1928—English missionary to Algeria, artist, writer, and journaler par excellence), biographer Miriam Rockness invites the reader to try their own hand at journaling, using Trotter as a model and guide. Rockness herself is no stranger to journaling, and her Preface to Beholdings enumerates the many benefits that await any reader who is willing to commit to the discipline for a period of time.
In the short term, Rockness describes how journaling encourages one to focus, to pay attention, to take the time to behold the beauty in the world before one’s very eyes. Each page following the Preface includes a quote designed to stir the imagination, and an image from Trotter’s journals to illustrate what it means to behold an acorn, a flower petal, a sunrise in the Algerian desert. It is not just to see what is before one’s eyes, but to hold it in the mind’s eye and cherish it. As Simone Weil said, “Attention, taken to its highest degree, is the same thing as prayer. It presupposes faith and love.” It is this kind of attention that Rockness encourages the journaler to cultivate, and it is the kind of attention that Lilias Trotter so artfully illustrates. There is ample space on each page for the journaler, thus inspired, to record his or her observations, musings, sketches, or doodles.
In the longer term, Rockness suggests that journaling helps cultivate a sense of proportion and perspective. She describes looking back with her husband over her journals from years before, reliving the moments that might otherwise have been forgotten, and allowing those glimpses in the rear view mirror to inform present day experience. Sometimes one finds that images seen in the rear view mirror really are smaller than they appeared at the time!
In addition to being an incitement to journaling, Beholdings is a beautifully produced creation in its own right. Great thought has gone into the selection of the typeface, the texture and feel of the paper, the quality of the images reproduced. This makes Beholdings not only a delight to own, but also an exquisite gift to offer. My advice: buy one for yourself, and another for someone you love.
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Reviewed in the United States on January 16, 2022
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