“Solnit is neither naive nor blind to the misery out of which she finds faith forged,” Deverell wrote. Critics lauded Solnit for her ability to walk this tightrope. Lean into sentiment and her message of resilience could get lost in platitudes and tragic lamentations.
Rely too much on history and she risks her writing becoming detached and lengthy, reminiscent of a collection of newspaper articles or a textbook. Perhaps one of Solnit’s greatest challenges in writing A Paradise Built in Hell was to balance factual retelling and emotion, not falling too hard on either side. A Paradise Built in Hell showcases her distinct voice, allowing her to demonstrate her depth as a writer as well as the breadth of her research. “Yet Rebecca Solnit sees human possibilities inherent in the certainty of big trouble.”īy the time A Paradise Built in Hell was published, Solnit had already established herself as a successful author and won critics’ approval for her books, including River of Shadows: Eadweard Muybridge and the Technological Wild West and Wanderlust: A History of Walking. “The bad news is that more disasters are coming, arising from any number of sources,” historian and Alta contributor William Deverell wrote in his review of Solnit’s book. Critics analyzed the book from the standpoint that disaster was a past occurrence or a hypothetical future, even though 2009 was a year with earthquakes, typhoons, and hurricanes of its own. When critics reviewed A Paradise Built in Hell, disaster, while inevitable, felt less immediate than it does now.
Investigating human behavior, Solnit concludes that the kindness of citizens in the aftermath of tragedy suggests we’re more capable of broad, long-term social change than we might realize.
We’re living through disasters as disruptive as the five Rebecca Solnit examines in her 2009 book, which Alta Journal’s California Book Club will discuss on September 23. It feels eerie to read A Paradise Built in Hell in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, wildfires, and the aftermath of Hurricane Ida.
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