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Rating: 
Summary: A love story far beyond the usual
Review: I first heard of Walter Anderson from an artist living in Mississippi when I was in high school, in 1963. She took me to the compound where Walter Anderson lived with his wife, brother and extended family. Anderson had become a recluse by this time, and I never met him. I got to see the pottery work he did and became fascinated with his art. As a sixteen-year-old, I was impressed with the colors and designs. I have aged, become an artist myself, and seen more of his work, I have come to appreciate the mystic quality, the blending of earth, sky, animals,plants, air, being and emotion into a whole expression.That this passionate expression was tied in with madness has fascinated me in understanding the edge between creativity, altered states of consciousness and mental illness. Understanding the complex persona of a person who has collapsed his entire life into his art is the challenge here. This is the person who tied himself to a tree on an island in the path of a hurricane to stay at work, after all. The relationship of this creative genius to his family and his struggle to bring forth the body of work we gratefully have today is the story of this book. It is honestly and well told. The unstated story is that without the tolerance, understanding, even suffering of Agnes Grinstead Anderson (the artist's wife), neither the man nor his work might have survived. In a time when people are less willingly to sacrifice for each other, This woman's story looks at the complications of a real life beyond the reach of easy pop psychology solutions.
Rating:
Summary: A love story far beyond the usual
Review: This is a wonderful book that chronicals the life of the brilliant, yet disturbed Mississippi artist, Walter Anderson. Told by Anderson's wife, Sissy, the book tells of the passion Anderson had for the natural world around him, and the torture he endured because of this passion. The book tells of Anderson's life as a boy, and the love affair that he and Sissy shared. It chronicals the relationship he had with his children, his bouts with mental illness and depression, his long stays on Horn Island (Anderson's own personal paradise) and the discovery of the magnificent "Little Room", full of brilliant murals and paintings.
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Summary: magical memories
Review: This is a wonderful book that chronicals the life of the brilliant, yet disturbed Mississippi artist, Walter Anderson. Told by Anderson's wife, Sissy, the book tells of the passion Anderson had for the natural world around him, and the torture he endured because of this passion. The book tells of Anderson's life as a boy, and the love affair that he and Sissy shared. It chronicals the relationship he had with his children, his bouts with mental illness and depression, his long stays on Horn Island (Anderson's own personal paradise) and the discovery of the magnificent "Little Room", full of brilliant murals and paintings.
Rating:
Summary: The eyes of a child
Review: Walter Anderson had the eyes of a child. His wonderment at the world around him, his passion for recording his love, and his driven personality -- all this makes for fascinating and inspirational and romantic reading. Anderson is being discovered as a true original -- his classical training in Europe and the Northeast is the foundation for his unusual work. I found this account to be as marvelous as the letters and life of Van Gogh. Sissy Anderson's writing is poetic and unpretentious. A classic.
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