What is important is the moment of opening a life and feeling it touch--with an electric hiss and cry--this speckled mineral sphere, our present world.
Annie DillardRead
Nature is, above all, profligate. Don't believe them when they tell you how economical and thrifty nature is, whose leaves return to the soil. Wouldn't it be cheaper to leave them on the tree in the first place? This deciduous business alone is a radical scheme, the brainchild of a deranged manic-depressive with limitless capital. Extravagance! Nature will try anything once.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes nature's extravagant and abundant qualities, challenging the notion of its thriftiness.
Annie Dillard's quote presents a perspective on nature that sees it as inherently lavish rather than economical. She critiques the idea that nature operates in a frugal manner, suggesting instead that its cyclical processes—in which leaves fall and decompose—reflect a radical, extravagant approach to life, highlighting nature's willingness to experiment and take risks.
Themes
NatureExtravaganceEconomyLeavesSoil
In practice
Example use cases
During a speech about environmental conservation, one might use this quote to illustrate the complexity and richness of natural processes.
More from Annie Dillard
All quotes →Geography is the key, the crucial accident of birth. A piece of protein could be a snail, a sea lion, or a systems analyst, but it had to start somewhere. This is not science; it is merely metaphor. And the landscape in which the protein "starts" shapes its end as surely as bowls shape water.
Annie DillardRead
Buddhism notes that it is always a mistake to think your soul can go it alone.
Annie DillardRead
Similarly, the impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned is not only shameful, it is destructive. Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you. You open your safe and find ashes.
Annie DillardRead
It is difficult to undo our own damage, and to recall to our presence that which we have asked to leave. It is hard to desecrate a grove and change your mind. The very holy mountains are keeping mum. We doused the burning bush and cannot rekindle it; we are lighting matches in vain under every green tree.
Annie DillardRead
To crank myself up I stood on a jack and ran myself up. I tightened myself like a bolt. I inserted myself in a vise-clamp and wound the handle till the pressure built. I drank coffee in titrated doses. It was a tricky business, requiring the finely tuned judgment of a skilled anesthesiologist. There was a tiny range within which coffee was effective, short of which it was useless, and beyond which, fatal.
Annie DillardRead
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Our Lord has written the promise of resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in springtime.
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Whatever peace I know rests in the natural world, in feeling myself a part of it, even in a small way.
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Trees go wandering forth in all directions with every wind, going and coming like ourselves, traveling with us around the sun two million miles a day, and through space heaven knows how fast and far!
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