Gift from the Sea

Gift from the Sea

Gift from the Sea

Gift from the Sea

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Overview

Over a quarter of a century after its first publication, the great and simple wisdom in this book continues to influence women's lives.


From the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780307805171
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Publication date: 08/10/2011
Sold by: Random House
Format: eBook
Pages: 144
Sales rank: 115,304
File size: 2 MB

About the Author

Reeve Lindbergh is the author of many books for both adults and children, including the memoirs Under a Wing and No More Words.


From the Hardcover edition.

Read an Excerpt

I began these pages for myself, in order to think out my own particular pattern of living, my own individual balance of life, work and human relationships. And since I think best with a pencil in my hand, I started naturally to write. I had the feeling, when the thoughts first clarified on paper, that my experience was very different from other people’s. (Are we all under this illusion?) My situation had, in certain ways, more freedom than that of most people, and in certain other ways, much less.

Besides, I thought, not all women are searching for a new pattern of living, or want a contemplative corner of their own. Many women are content with their lives as they are. They manage amazingly well, far better than I, it seemed to me, looking at their lives from the outside. With envy and admiration, I observed the porcelain perfection of their smoothly ticking days. Perhaps they had no problems, or had found the answers long ago. No, I decided, these discussions would have value and interest only for myself.

But as I went on writing and simultaneously talking with other women, young and old, with different lives and experiences—those who supported themselves, those who wished careers, those who were hard-working housewives and mothers, and those with more ease—I found that my point of view was not unique. In varying settings and under different forms, I discovered that many women, and men too, were grappling with essentially the same questions as I, and were hungry to discuss and argue and hammer out possible answers. Even those whose lives had appeared to be ticking imperturbably under their smiling clock-faces were often trying, like me, to evolve another rhythm with more creative pauses in it, more adjustment to their individual needs, and new and more alive relationships to themselves as well as others.

And so gradually, these chapters, fed by conversations, arguments and revelations from men and women of all groups, became more than my individual story, until I decided in the end to give them back to the people who had shared and stimulated many of these thoughts. Here, then, with my warm feelings of gratitude and companionship for those working along the same lines, I return my gift from the sea.

Table of Contents

Introduction to the Fiftieth Anniversary Edition by Reeve Lindbergh vii 

1 The Beach 7 
2 Channelled Whelk 13 
3 Moon Shell 31 
4 Double-Sunrise 53 
5 Oyster Bed 69 
6 Argonauta 81 
7 A Few Shells 103 
8 The Beach at My Back 113 

Gift from the Sea Re-opened 121
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