The Turquoise Ledge: A Memoir (2010) - Plot & Excerpts
a diary or day-book of Silko's days and walks in the hills and arroyos surrounding her home near Tucson. One of things I loved about this book is that nothing happens--it's like sitting next to a wise, nice friend with not much to do, listening to them tell of what they've observed, how they've lived out their recent days. Or a long walk with a guide who knows the land as well as it could be known in a human life of deep veneration and close observation. You trust Silko, it's a very intimate conversation. Of course, because in a sense nothing happens, Silko's remarkable sympathetic relationship to the land, weather, plant and animal lives that surround her comes vividly to the fore. Her house is a zoo - she raises macaws, British mastiffs, and other creatures. In an manner opposite to what most of do, she opens her house and life as completely as possible to other creatures, rather than shut them out. She practically raises rattlesnakes, taking great care not to obstruct their hunting, resting and movements. Silko is very much a self-trained naturalist, carefully tracking the shifting shape of land she's in, especially the changes made by the periodic flooding of nearby arroyos. But her relationship to creation is not scientific, but profoundly religious and animistic. She receives messages from Star Beings, ancient Aztec star deities often hostile or indifferent to humans, and is moved to paint a series of portraits of them under their guidance. She communes with clouds, instructing us that is possible to speak with them (not with our human voice though, which is ugly). An unusually large gathering of grasshopppers is seen not as infestation, but as a proud gathering of Lord Chapulin, the great Grasshopper Being, his wife, and their army.All of this is told "straight up", in all seriousness. It is not poetic or metaphorical elaboration, but the way things are and the way they demand to be heard and told. I know of no other modern author with such a living, spiritualist relationship with the surrounding world. Silko could have accomplished as much in the space of an essay. Her descriptions of the landscape and the rocks and animals that inhabit it quickly become repetitious and tiring, and the book lacks any tension or narrative to keep it interesting. If you're looking for something like her previous books like CEREMONY and STORYTELLER, you won't find it here. If you're new to Silko, try STORYTELLER, a memoir that, like this, isn't quite a traditional memoir, but unlike this, braids together Silko's family, the natural world around her and the stories she knows and tells to keep the reader's interest. THE TURQUOISE LEDGE is definitely full of lovely descriptions and access to the mind of a brilliant and eccentric Native writer, which I absolutely appreciated, but it was hard to stay with her for 300+ pages of what didn't ever quite transcend a long journal of her walks.
What do You think about The Turquoise Ledge: A Memoir (2010)?
Another disappointment (see Wendell Berry review) - Perhaps I should try one of her novels.
—pelali_kute24_7
A good book by a great writer, well-written but some of her obsessions are strange.
—twin2ser
Love the ambient feeling of the Arizona desert Silko brings to this memoir.
—BELL
Didn't finish...good, but had to return it
—sayedwajid
