Harlan and Anna Hubbard give us a glimpse of what human life might look like if we lived open to the natural world — as open as we can be and still function. As such, Payne Hollow Journal, the last book Harlan Hubbard wrote, may become one of the more important books of our time. Wendell Berry, in the introduction to an earlier Harlan Hubbard book, Shantyboat, A River Way of Life wrote:
Harlan’s most obvious literary ancestors are Mark Twain and Henry David Thoreau. But I think it has not been fully appreciated how their work is brought to maturity and fulfilled in his. My point and my difficulty are equally embedded in the realization that this is not purely a literary judgment. I do not mean to argue that Harlan Hubbard surpasses these two predecessors as a writer. But he does surpass them, I think, in the practical force of his wisdom that, among other things, makes it impossible to judge him in purely literary terms. When we speak of the work of Mark Twain and Henry Thoreau we are speaking of their writing; they lived, in varying degrees, apart from their work. Aside from their writing, we can take only a biographical interest in what they did. But when we speak of Harlan’s work we obviously cannot be speaking just of his writing. We are speaking of his life — or, more exactly and complexly, of his and Anna’s life. Or we are speaking of the lifework of an adventurer, husband, shantyboater, subsistence farmer, carpenter, fisherman, student, musician, painter, who at times has had to make use of writing to complete himself, to speak to others, to attach himself more exactly to things and meanings. And this difference is involved in others.
In his introduction to Payne Hollow Journal, editor Don Wallis writes of the impressions he gathered while visiting the Hubbard home:
Sometimes we would eat a noonday dinner, a ceremony in the Payne Hollow day. It was in summer the first time I experienced this event. Anna served us broiled catfish, which Harlan had caught that morning in the river, and a lavish salad from their garden, tomatoes and comfrey and wild, vivid mint; our dessert was rhubarb glistened with elderberries, which Anna had gathered that morning in the woods. She served the food on china hand painted blue. We sat at a walnut table Harlan had fashioned out of driftwood, by a wall full of windows open to the sky. We were bathed in the sun’s soft light. Birds sang. There was a tingling breeze dancing through the hollow, playing in the leaves of the trees. I gazed out at the river in the distance, searching for some words to say, but found none. I thought of what people in Madison said, that the Hubbard's lived a primitive life. I heard myself murmur, “You have all the advantages” and was embarrassed by this; but Harlan and Anna graciously accepted my praise, knowing what I meant.
Harlan Hubbard had a wild, wild soul. That was his essential self. Everything — his art, his writing, all his work, his way of life — flowed from this source. By wild I mean fresh, bright, gentle, subtle, alert, beautiful, and free. Harlan had the soul of a shy wild bird, of a wildflower growing in the woods, of the leaves of a tree blowing softly in the wind. I also mean alone, self contained, apart from the world. Harlan wrote in his book Payne Hollow:
I yearn for the wild, I lean toward its absolute solitude... Today as I swam in the river I looked up with a wild duck’s eye into the trees waving as the wind rushed through them, lightly rattling the cottonwood leave s.... Suddenly, I felt alone on the earth, as I do when lying on the damp ground in spring to see closely the bloodroot raising its leaf sheath through the mold. These moments are not rare. I can summon them when I feel the need to retire into the wilderness. For this is my wilderness, untouched by man, of infinite grace and harmony.The following additional excerpts, among many others in the book, have captured my imagination and heart and given me solace.
I was up before daybreak this morning. The sky was cloudless, the air clear and calm. The stars bright, the moon being in the first quarter. By the light of the stars I tread well known paths, carrying buckets of sand up from the riverbank. The brilliant searchlight of a towboat flashing back and forth spoils the effect of starlight. After it is gone, I notice that one corner of Orion is down behind the western hill and the morning star has ascended in the east. A faint light can be seen there, my paths become somewhat lighter. The stars pale, and light floods the earth. What a blessing it is, given to us every day.
- December 6, 1956
Instead of dashing through the day, completing one activity as quickly as possible so as to get at something else, it would be better to savor each part of the day as if this were your last day. Get as much out of the present moment as possible, from daybreak to bedtime. Even sleeping should be done well, even if one must wake up now and then to enjoy the night. When you eat, give each dish its full importance and extract its individual flavor... Most everything we do deserves reverence, and a special setting. But one must live naturally, without pretense.
- January 2, 1961
Light snow during the night. I step out — and spoil its perfect cleanness. Such is man’s life on this earth.
- January 22, 1961
To attain your principles, to live by them, to defy the world, that would be a stirring life. But what of those people to whom you are attached, and obligated? They do not share your principles, perhaps they have none. Who has, except for narrow rules of conduct which fit in with the turn of their minds, with their likes and aversions? Should these people be defied, too? Or can we be satisfied with merely believing in our principles, while acting against them for the sake of others? This has been my problem all my life.
- April 30, 1961
I save time and steps by carrying water to the goats from the inside tap, but I prefer to carry it from the creek, a long haul sometimes. This evening I found a clear pool after passing some ice from under which the water had all drained. As I dipped into the pool I saw the golden half moon reflected there, and was glad I came.
- January 14, 1962
On the surface life goes on, people live together or meet casually, behaving like the normal, rational creatures they are supposed to be, but under the surface there is a raging furnace in each one, or a cold, frozen hell of despair. A truly brave cheerful man, with living faith and hope, is rare to see. But it is not easy to have faith and hope. A man is beset by awful dangers, ever on the point of breaking up and going under, to say nothing of the aggravations and miseries attendant on this system of living. How do men face all this who have not a love of beauty, who cannot derive peace and encouragement from this lovely earth or from the arts? - February 14, 1962
No woodcutting today, and I miss it. It would be good to spend a winter just cutting wood, burning it to keep warm, cooking food and eating it, sleeping through the long winter nights. Then there would be time to watch the sunrise, and sunset, the stars and the moon, the winter birds and bare trees. - February 18, 1962
Probably this experiment of living here will be regarded as a failure in the end, perhaps even by Anna; but to me, it will not be a failure. I knew in the beginning it could not be an obvious and complete success.
- March 8, 1962
Anna baked bread today, and I had the happy thought of making a small bread board so that the loaf could be cut at table. Thus it gets its due admiration, and the rite of cutting is enjoyed. Also there are no leftover slices.
- April 5, 1962
When I went out under the trees last night, heard the chirping of the first crickets, the dreaming trill of frogs, just as the yellow moon rested on the far hills, there seemed such peace, serenity and comfort in the unfolding night, with its soft scented air.
- May 13, 1962
The danger is to see and hear with the intellect instead of the senses, or rather with the intellect alone, instead of the intellect through the senses. Nothing is more perishable than our relations with the earth. It must be constantly renewed. Come in a house, think of something else, become absorbed in some work — it is gone. This communion is only possible when the mind is free. The body may be doing whatever else it wants to do.
- January 6, 1963
This was one of the rare mornings of the year, a clear sunrise over the snowy earth, fog on the river, frost crystals in the air, floating through the path of the sun’s light. When the fog cleared the riverbank trees were all made of crystal, as were the woods on our hill. , - January 14, 1964
What made yesterday a day of wonders? In the warm evening, half moon overhead, Venus bright nearby, a whip-poor-will’s song from across the river in Indiana somewhere, the peeping of frogs, the fragrance of moist earth and growing things. (No sweet fragrance, like that of flowering wild grape or locust. That comes later.) The caressing mildness of the south wind, whose effect I remember from boyhood, when it caused one to leap and skip on the first barefoot days. (My friend’s mother used to let him go barefoot on the day he saw the first butterfly. I have seen two recently.) All day I was teased by the song of an unseen warbler, a rising trill, perhaps the prairie, which I hear during the summer, or the paula, which I have rarely seen. I tried to see the singer, when it was near, leaning my back against a tree and looking up into a flowering tree, which I discovered to be full of birds pecking around in the blossoms, strange patterns of black and yellow, then two strident blue jays flew into the tree and out, a small flock of goldfinches passed through; some smoky yellow birds, the size of cedar waxwings — what did it matter if I could not identify them? For a few moments I lived in another world, experienced life on another plane of existence, which seemed to me fair as paradise, though the birds were merely getting a living and enjoying themselves, as I was. - April 19, 1964
Visitors at evening, a young couple.... Many such (young, a tendency toward culture, no aim or conviction but with a sympathy toward experiments in natural living, dissatisfaction with present conditions and ways of living, a feeling that many people are not living successful lives, inwardly, and that their own lives will be unsuccessful, whatever step they take). They are not inclined to live as we do, nor have they the required manual skill, or interest in that direction. Hard work of any kind does not appeal.
- April 26, 1964
Monday A.M. I butchered, the sacrifice being Booster the big buck (goat), a hard task because we were good friends. Yet the contract must be kept. He died nobly, without a sound, hardly any struggling, so different from the young bucks who leap at the rope’s end like a hooked fish. - December 8, 1964
Snow began to fall in the night — bare spots of ground were just whitened when I looked out …. This is one of the sights, one of the experiences I live for.
- February 1, 1964
