E. B. White (1899–1985)

I started reading this in 2013, but being 662 pages long, it got set aside and buried at some point. A couple of months ago I dug it back up and have finally finished it.
What a charming and pithy letter writer was Mr. White. I guess that's no surprise given that he became a co-author of the famous "Elements of Style" on just that subject.
I loved meeting his friends and family in this way, and learning his views. Despite enjoying a bevy of "litry" friends and several friends outside that show more realm as well, he seems on the whole, to have been a shy person, never accepting an offer to speak to, or even belong to any group, nor even make an appearance to receive a national award from a president (both Kennedy and Nixon show up in these pages).
I mostly loved his interest in, affection for, and attendance to creatures in all shapes and sizes.
What struck me too, about the book, that seems unique to a book of letters, was the passage of time. He doesn’t mention his age until he’s in his 50’s, by which time we've already had visits to the hospital for one thing or another for he or his wife, and then, occasionally, an age number is dropped, and each time is a call to reminisce about the days of old, even though I wasn’t alive when he was young. Imagining, at times, my folks in those days, I'd gotten fond of his memories, as though they were mine and I missed our younger days of better health and less clash, grit, and modernity in our world. show less

In the Canadian wilderness one spring a cygnet was born. Louis was small, grey and downy just like his brothers and sisters, but he was different in one important way: he was mute, unable to make the usual peeping and beeping noises that young cygnets make. As the cygnets grew, Louis' condition began to worry his parents, to the extent that they became concerned about his potential to find a mate when the time came if he could not trumpet. His father decided to take matters into his own show more hands and broke into a music store, stealing a trumpet and giving Louis a voice for the first time.

I selected this title as part of the Read Harder 2025 challenge, in the category "reread a childhood favorite." I opted to listen to the audiobook this time around, which was narrated by the author, a fantastic storyteller. It was cool to know you're hearing the pronunciation and emphasis interpreted in exactly the way the creator meant them to be, even though the book was written more than 50 years ago. I loved this book when I first read it in elementary school and, despite some dated language, it holds up really well. It's a very sweet story with complex character development and personalities. I also distinctly recall this book being the very first time I had ever heard of watercress. show less

This collection of thirty-one essays by E.B. White is as delightful as it is varied. The essays are arranged by subject - the farm, the city, and memories, to name a few - but even within these subjects, the collection showcases the breadth of White's thoughts and interests. In one, he discusses "The Death of a Pig," a short but powerful piece that gave me a glimpse of the man who would save the pig in Charlotte's Web. In another, he wrestles with the troubles of hydrogen bomb testing and show more disarmament, never giving a definite Answer, but provoking thought in himself and his reader.

I took several weeks to read these essays, not out of any lack of enjoyment but because of the need to savor each and pause between them. I've come to the conclusion that collections like this need to be owned rather than borrowed so that I can take my time and muse over each one instead of trying to hurry through and evaluate the book as a whole. I loved White's sense of humor, which permeates every essay and includes a few good one liners about politics, "progress," and even himself. In the foreword, he writes, "The essayist is a self-liberated man, sustained by the childish belief that everything he thinks about, everything that happens to him, is of general interest." Though I can't say much about general interest, I can say that this collection was to my interest, and I would love to own this collection to dip into whenever I like. show less

I've never seen the movie or read book before; came across author EB White while reading a biography of John Updike (as a fellow writer on the New Yorker) so thought I'd give it a go. And it's an absolutely lovely little tale: banish all fears of Disneyesque schmaltz from the very first sentence: "Where's Papa going with that axe?"
Papa is off to despatch the runt of the litter....daughter Fern gets to bring him (Wilbur) up, until he's sent to a local farm, where his indolent, well-fed ...and show more rather lonely ...life becomes tinged with terror as the sheep lets on that he's being fattened up for Christmas. But stablemate Charlotte, the spider...and, more grudgingly, Templeton the rat...try to fix things...
Could be cutesy, but White's themes of change, life and death, keep it very readable. And I feel more favourably disposed to arachnids... show less