I recently began re-reading The Good Life, a book I had bought back in high school and never finished. Mostly forgotten, I picked it up on a trip home and delved in. A sort of joint autobiography/handbook by Scott and Helen Nearing, it recounts their means and methods for dropping out of society and going back to the land. The book is really two books under one cover: Living the Good Life, published in 1951, and Continuing the Good Life, published in 1979, four years before Scott's death at age 100.
The story begins in New York City, 1930. The Nearings, were, at that time, 26 (Helen), and 47 (Scott). The text refers to them, collectively, as "approaching fifty." (I took that at face value, not realizing their age difference until I did some research online.) The age difference is not explained in the text, but Scott had a wife before Helen, Nellie, and a son, John. Vague intimations are made about them losing their jobs because of radical politics. Scott, a professor, was an ardent socialist and radical anti-war advocate, and lost his job due to Communist hysteria and perceived treason due to his opposition to American involvement in World War 1. Looking to drop out of the dominant consumer-industrial culture of the time (funny, as we complain about that now, in an age of TV, the internet, and unprecedented consumer spending) and fashion a self-sufficient lifestyle for themselves, the Nearings moved to rural Vermont, buying an old farm at the foot of Stratton Mountain.
The story begins in New York City, 1930. The Nearings, were, at that time, 26 (Helen), and 47 (Scott). The text refers to them, collectively, as "approaching fifty." (I took that at face value, not realizing their age difference until I did some research online.) The age difference is not explained in the text, but Scott had a wife before Helen, Nellie, and a son, John. Vague intimations are made about them losing their jobs because of radical politics. Scott, a professor, was an ardent socialist and radical anti-war advocate, and lost his job due to Communist hysteria and perceived treason due to his opposition to American involvement in World War 1. Looking to drop out of the dominant consumer-industrial culture of the time (funny, as we complain about that now, in an age of TV, the internet, and unprecedented consumer spending) and fashion a self-sufficient lifestyle for themselves, the Nearings moved to rural Vermont, buying an old farm at the foot of Stratton Mountain.
