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The Solace of Open Spaces Paperback – December 2, 1986

by Gretel Ehrlich (Author)
4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 1,122 ratings
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A collection of transcendent, lyrical essays on life in the American West, the classic companion to Gretel Ehrlich’s new book, Unsolaced

“Wyoming has found its Whitman.” —Annie Dillard

Poet and filmmaker Gretel Ehrlich went to Wyoming in 1975 to make the first in a series of documentaries when her partner died. Ehrlich stayed on and found she couldn’t leave. The Solace of Open Spaces is a chronicle of her first years on “the planet of Wyoming,” a personal journey into a place, a feeling, and a way of life.
 
Ehrlich captures both the otherworldly beauty and cruelty of the natural forces—the harsh wind, bitter cold, and swiftly changing seasons—in the remote reaches of the American West. She brings depth, tenderness, and humor to her portraits of the peculiar souls who also call it home: hermits and ranchers, rodeo cowboys and schoolteachers, dreamers and realists. Together, these essays form an evocative and vibrant tribute to the life Ehrlich chose and the geography she loves.
 
Originally written as journal entries addressed to a friend, The Solace of Open Spaces is raw, meditative, electrifying, and uncommonly wise. In prose “as expansive as a Wyoming vista, as charged as a bolt of prairie lightning” (Newsday), Ehrlich explores the magical interplay between our interior lives and the world around us.
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Previous page
  1. Print length
    144 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Penguin Books
  4. Publication date
    December 2, 1986
  5. Dimensions
    5.06 x 0.38 x 7.75 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0140081135
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0140081138
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"Everything in nature invites us constantly to be what we are. We are often like rivers: careless and forceful, timid and dangerous, lucid and muddied, eddying, gleaming, still." Whether she's reflecting on nature's teachings, divulging her experiences as a cowpuncher, or painting vivid word portraits of the people she lives and works with, Gretel Ehrlich's observations are lyrical and funny, wise and authentic. After moving from the city to a vast new state, she writes of adjusting to cowboy life, boundless open spaces, and the almost incomprehensible harshness of a Wyoming winter:

"When it's fifty below, the mercury bottoms out and jiggles there as if laughing at those of us still above ground. Once I caught myself on tiptoes, peering down into the thermometer as if there were an extension inside inscribed with higher and higher declarations of physical misery: ninety below to the power of ten and so on."

After experiencing the isolated life of a sheep herder, she writes, "Keenly observed the world is transformed. The landscape is engorged with detail, every movement on it chillingly sharp. The air between people is charged. Days unfold, bathed in their own music. Nights become hallucinatory; dreams, prescient."

Ehrlich's gift is one of subtle precision. She writes beauty into the plainest of thoughts and meaning into the simplest of ideas: "True solace is finding none, which is to say, it is everywhere." --Kathryn True

Review

Praise for Gretel Ehrlich and The Solace of Open Spaces:

"Any one of [its 12 chapters] stands beautifully on its own . . . She brings the long vistas into focus with the poise of an Ansel Adams." —The New York Times Book Review

"A stunning rumination on life on Wyoming's High Plains . . . Ehrlich's gorgeous prose is as expansive as a Wyoming vista, as charged as a bolt of prairie lightning." —Newsday 

"Ehrlich's best prose belongs in a league with Annie Dillard and even Thoreau. The Solace of Open Spaces releases the bracing air of the wilderness into the stuffy, heated confines of winter in civilization." —San Francisco Chronicle

"Ehrlich [is] a gifted essayist and nature writer." —The Washington Post

"Vivid, tough, and funny . . . an exuberant and powerful book." —Annie Dillard

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Penguin Books (December 2, 1986)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 144 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0140081135
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0140081138
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 4.2 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.06 x 0.38 x 7.75 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 1,122 ratings

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Gretel Ehrlich

Gretel Ehrlich

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Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5
1,122 global ratings
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Top reviews from the United States

kmd57
5.0 out of 5 stars Prose as transcendent as the most beautiful poetry.
Reviewed in the United States on March 8, 2023
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This short collection of essays reminds me of why I studied literature and creative writing in college. Too often we get lost in just reading novels and need to get back to basics. A finely tuned essay is poetry to the trained ear, and these are among the finest I have read.
Yes, I must admit that I purchased this book after it was mentioned in an episode of Yellowstone, but you don't have to be a fan of the tv show to enjoy this.
12 people found this helpful
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Bubbalicious
5.0 out of 5 stars She Paints With Prose
Reviewed in the United States on July 12, 2016
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I was introduced to Gretel Ehrlich by a good friend in the early 90's and was humbled by her prose. Nowhere before had I read such magnificent and insightful impressions. Her writing gave life to the subtle beauty of open sky and lent movement to the endless landscape. She painted in prose.

My connection with her writing came from being raised in grasslands framed by mountains. I grew up outside, on horses and with antelopes too. I saw her descriptions as authentic and undiminished by cliché, the crutch of most interlopers, especially journalistic writers.

So this is my point, Gretel Ehrlich somehow has the ability to see, feel and emote what I can’t; the experience of being a tiny creature who is only part of an enormous world where beauty is often subtle. Her descriptions of the life of clouds and the movement of wind, alone, make this book worth reading.

Not many people have the circumspection to see themselves from the inside and outside at the same time. For many people, the wilderness is a simulacrum of what they project on it. For Ehrlich, it seems as though she truly allows herself to simply be a conduit for the experience.

I’d recommend this book for anyone who has gone weeks without a radio or television. You’ll recognize the life she describes. For everyone else, it may be a hint of what ‘solace’ really is.

Thanks for reading.
48 people found this helpful
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Beverly Ann McCall
4.0 out of 5 stars The Solace of Open Space
Reviewed in the United States on February 4, 2024
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Solace of Open Spaces is a compilation of essays penned by Gretel Ehrlich that capture the reflecive and healing process she experienced while navigating the personal loss of a husband and the fulfillment of an assignment. I enjoyed the way she combines her observations, reflections and learning on two separate planes—the grandeur, beauty, and harshness of nature and the devasting emotional struggle of coming to terms with the loss of a loved one. Ms. Ehrlich’s skill with descriptive language pulls readers into these essays. I felt at times I was with her as she experiences the vast, isolated, and harsh environment as well as her interactions with the people she highlights. From each perspectives she allows readers to feel the tension and healing as they occur. So often human beings are so absorbed in their present and sometimes mundane existence that they become blind to the beauty around them. However, when coming face to face with the vastness and quietness of space they discover through self-reflection an appreciation of said natural beauty that allows the healing of one’s soul. This turned out to be an enjoyable and rewarding read.
One person found this helpful
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S. Peterson
5.0 out of 5 stars Quality!
Reviewed in the United States on January 6, 2024
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The speed of delivery and condition were exactly as described. I’m so happy with my purchase. Already read it and loved every word.
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Elizabeth Clark
5.0 out of 5 stars Why I love the open spaces.
Reviewed in the United States on March 27, 2022
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Being born & raised in a Dairy Farm in Southeastern Wi I can relate to the solace found in open spaces. As well as the fragility that comes with the struggle to survive there as the changing season, weather & prices fight against you.

The stories of the old timers, takes me back to being a young child listening to my great Aunts, Uncles & Grandparents tell of their childhood & struggles. I miss the & cherish those stories even more now.

One thing always remains even today, those open spaces no matter how harsh & barren leave a mark on us & our souls. While also giving us a peace in those places that one will love, moss and yearn for for the rest of iur lives. As one who finds solace in these places always carries a piece of it with them no matter where they go.

These Essays truly remind me of my days running, working & loving the opens spaces & brings their memories forward once again in my mind & heart. And that is the true beauty found after one leaves the open spaces.

As once you find solace, you never lose that feeling. No matter where you go, its the lifelong gift those places give you.
13 people found this helpful
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R. P. L.
3.0 out of 5 stars Not as good as I'd hoped. Dated.
Reviewed in the United States on August 31, 2019
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This is a lyrical, poetic, carefully written memoir of Ehrlich's life in Wyoming following the death of a man she had loved. She's from the city, but the wild open spaces of the West do her some good. She gets married, learns to survive where there are many more cattle than people, when she once thrived in a world of the urban intellectual.

I liked the descriptions of the weather, the lonesome cowboys, the capaciousness of the sky, the hard work of ranching.

I'd come across a mention of the book after I'd finished rereading Walden. I wanted something like it.

This isn't Walden. It's quite often about Ehrlich and her emotional states, good and bad, dealing with her loss and learning to love again in an environment that teaches her patience and the meaning of hard work and hard living.

The carefulness of the writing got to me in the last quarter of the book. Too much metaphor, too much preciousness; it distanced me from Ehlich's story of rejuvenation. Ehrlich really tried to make her prose "gorgeous" (as Newsday correctly called it). I wanted it to be more straightforward. And some of her similes are awkward.

Though the book is very short, I feel it should have ended after she got married. What follows that event has a "tagged on" feel to it, as though her editor told her to "Write some more; we have to make it longer."

Her long chapter detailing her visit with the Crow and other indigenous tribes is mildly off-putting. Here's an example (p. 118): "Indians [sic] don't go home at night; they camp out where the action is, en masse, whole extended families and clans spanning several generations. It's a tradition with them the way sending our kids to summer camp is with us." Summer camp? Who's this "us" she's speaking of?

If you're going to to be visiting Wyoming, this book would be a great primer for that experience, giving you a greater appreciation of what you might experience there.
34 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

Off books
5.0 out of 5 stars Grief in a western landscape
Reviewed in India on December 2, 2023
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It was probably coincidence but my three random book choices one after the other turned out to be a story about grief woven in with a story of a western landscape. The book was excellent and then I read this one which was equally good and satisfying. The writer is adept at narrating the scenes of life in a harsh and unforgiving landscape and how she comes to learn to live with it and survive physically and emotionally.
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aliA
5.0 out of 5 stars Loved it
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 25, 2023
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Beautifully descriptive writing - loved it & have recommended it to others.
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Kevin Ford
4.0 out of 5 stars Very interesting book
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 5, 2023
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Great stories and very well written.
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Pete Howcroft
5.0 out of 5 stars Inspiring...
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 14, 2010
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This book should be in your top list of books to read.
The author moved from a comfortable life style, following a personal
tragedy, to life in the wilderness of America. Her account, her guts, her wonderful use of language, the people she met, and her perception make this a definite must. Don't let it escape.
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Paul Cohen
5.0 out of 5 stars Sublime and poetic
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 29, 2017
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This is one of my all-time favorite books. A sublime and poetic collection of impressions of Wyoming, its hermits, cowboys and different seasons.
One person found this helpful
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