Book Review--Meanwhile, Next Door to the Good Life

This week I finished reading Meanwhile, Next Door to the Good Life by Jean Hay Bright. It's taken me awhile to ruminate on the book, and on how to blog about it.

The author spent a number of years in close contact with Scott and Helen Nearing and Eliot Coleman as a homesteader in Maine. The story is autobiographical, but contains a lot of details about these well-known neighbors as their lives intertwined through the years. There is a lot less gloss in this book than in the Nearings' own accounts but it succeeds in humanizing them much more than their own books do.

And I'm not sure how I feel about this. I first read about the Nearings about 15 years ago, when I was first discovering this whole "homesteading" movement, Mother Earth News and all. I suppose I idealized them somewhat, though I didn't agree with the whole philosophical/anti-religious platform they stood for. After reading Bright's book, however, and without giving away too much of the ending, I was left wondering how much the Nearings were gilding the lily, and how much they would have been able to accomplish without outside support. I continue to admire their accomplishments nevertheless--they were very gifted at communicating their ideals.

Meanwhile, Next Door to the Good Life also got me thinking more generally about the homesteading movement in the 60's and 70's and the lack of stable family structures that likely predestined the movement's decline. All the families in Brights' book were touched by divorce, including her own, and the "free love" ethic permeated the whole movement. I have noticed this trend in other 70's homesteading books too--the starry-eyed authors end up divorced and living in suburbia by the end of the book. This is a rather sweeping generalization, I know, and I am sure that it was not true in every case, but it seems to be a common pattern.

I think, I hope, that today's Christian agrarianism movement will be different. Most of this group has a strong family ethic, giving the movement a much firmer foundation. A deep religious faith and commitment to faith communities undergirds those family commitments. By basing its decisions on faith and family, rather than on freedom and rebellion, I believe that this generation of back-to-the-landers is building a lifestyle and a heritage that will endure.

Back to the book--it's an interesting read whether you're a Nearing fan or not. If you're into homesteading stories, check it out!