Rating: 
Summary: Self-help without the jargon
Review: This title was a recent selection for a book discussion group that I helped organize for my library. As the only male in the group, I felt somewhat compelled to offer token protest to the selection of this classic example of a "woman's book," but actually I was intrigued by it. Everything I had read about "Gift From the Sea" praised its meditative quality and I had to admit that the promise of that rather appealed to me.I wound up reading the bulk of the book on Mothers' Day, which seemed quite appropriate, given that among the many issues Lindbergh addresses here is the need for mothers to find a balance between their own needs and those of their children and husbands. The need for time to one's self, a "room of one's own", the need for a spriritual dimension to one's existence--well, it seems so obvious that these needs have to be met if a woman--if any human being--is to be fulfilled and to be able to meet her (or his) responsibilities with joy rather than with dread. But the lessons that Anne Morrow Lindbergh taught in 1955 still need to be voiced in 2000--perhaps more than ever. Lindbergh seems prescient when she speaks of the dangers of the "life of multiplicity" which had already taken root in the immediate post-War era. We know all too well that it has not gotten any better in the past 50 years and that women's lives in particular have become more stressful and, to use Lindbergh's word, "fragmented" in the past half-century. What distinguishes Lindbergh's book from today's current crop of self-help or New Age sprititual books though is its lyrical quality. Her careful, belletristic prose is soothing and, yes, meditative in and of itself. Reading it seems to bring about the very centeredness and balance that she seeks to describe. Although she includes no bibliography (and rightly so, as this is not a tract), I would hope that many of her readers would be inspired to seek out the works of some of the writers she quotes in the context of these essays. She does the world a great service in suggesting how Rilke, for example, whose poetry may seem impenetrable at first, can actually speak to the concerns of our own lives.
Rating: 
Summary: A beautiful legacy
Review: When I left home for college in 1978, my mother gave me a copy of this book. Some twenty years before, her mother gave her a copy of Anne Morrow Lindbergh's sweet musings of life as a woman. A few years ago, I bought a copy of Gift From the Sea to give to my own daughter who was leaving home for the first time. That this book speaks to multi-generations is part of its allure. People from my mother's generation will recall the Lindbergh's public tragedy of a kidnapped and murdered son. Although AML doesn't speak of this in her book, the knowledge of this awful event and what it must have meant to the author colored my perspective as a reader, adding to my respect for her essays. Gift from the Sea has become a legacy in my family; someday I hope to give copies to my grandchildren.
Rating:
Summary: Gift From the Sea is a true gift for those in mourning...
Review: When the death of a loved one causes the centrifugal force of life's merry-go-round to come to an abrupt halt, reading Anne Morrow Lindburgh's "Gift From the Sea" gives order to the chaotic thoughts which suddenly bombard one's consciousness. How comforting and calming! It is a book to keep on one's top shelf for frequent reference, within easy reach of its restorative qualities.
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