Return to "Place of Harmony"

For those who have not visited this site before, the title refers to the utopian community established on Malcolm Island, 250 miles northwest of Vancouver, at the end of the 19th century. Here is a pretty good link to the history of the community. The founders were Finnish, thus the Finnish word "Sointula" indicating a place of harmony. I was invited to give a paper at a conference on utopian ideas in the 18th century at a small conference that was held here in 2013 and have been coming back every summer (excluding 2020) since. I have only been running this blog for a few years, which consists mostly of reports of my stay here. I am a totally urban person who lives on the Upper West Side of New York, and the contrast could not be greater. No car horns in the morning. No garbage trucks. No sirens traveling past to the retirement home on the corner of my street. No robo calls, as I only have my flip phone here. I'll erase all of them on my return in September. Yes, it will be another summer-long stay. I live again in the same cottage, where the mornings are full of my own work, and occasionally the afternoon as well, but mostly I go out and see all my friends, go on hikes, associate with people who can identify mushrooms and trees, who fix their own roofs, who build things.

 

( I hardly ever mention my own work here. For that, you can go to my Goethe blog, but FYI I managed to finish my long article on Goethe and am now revisiting a a literary essay begun at the beginning of the year.) 

Previous posts on this blog have introduced many of my Sointula friends and activities. For the blog this summer I might concentrate here on new sights, including, for instance, the lovely pattern of shadows cast by the plum tree outside my window. (Click to enlarge.) Below is a picture of my desk, as messy already as in New York. There is also a table in the living room, where I keep all the books and papers in connection with various projects. Those funny growths on the tree are oyster mushrooms, which Milan picked for dinner on our walk on the road to Mitchell Bay. And always there are the Sointula skies, which I cannot get enough of.

 More to come.