I’m sure the author, who grew up Hutterite, would approve of my frugality–or at least understand it. Saving rather than spending is a way of life among many of the small religious communities whose roots go back to Austria, Switzerland, Southern Germany, and Moravia in the 16th century.

Since my own memoir-in-progress tells the story of growing up in the 1950′s and ’60′s as a Mennonite in Lancaster County, PA, I have created a sub category just for Anabaptist memoir. This category includes Amish, Mennonite, and now Hutterite, memoir. If you are interested in what it’s like to live under a polka dot scarf on the Canadian prairie, you are not likely to find a better memoir than I Am Hutterite or a better guide than Mary-Ann Kirkby.

Before telling you more about the memoir, I recommend that you listen to this Hutterite Choir singing “Jesus Remember Me” in Steinbach, Manitoba, Canada. My guess is that if Mary Ann Kirkby listened to this video, she became misty-eyed. I did myself. Four-part a capella singing opens all the chambers of the heart, and if you grew up listening to this music, it opens them even wider.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBHh8toVV_o&w=560&h=349]

The garb of the musicians matches the garb the author wears on the front cover of her memoir. Only now instead of dressing in this old-fashioned way every day, she has to borrow a Hutterite outfit from a friend. As you read, you may feel as though you are donning a Pfaht (white shirt), Mieder (vest), Kittle (skirt), and Fittig (pleated apron). The author brings you into her childhood world deftly, while fully aware that most readers will be outsiders. She describes a normal morning in a Hutterite colony, with men and women streaming toward the community kitchen for breakfast. She contrasts how her mother Mary might have viewed the scene–as familiar as the sunrise. Then she thinks about how the scene would look to an outsider to whom “the setting and period costumes, adopted from sixteenth-century peasants, would have seemed staged, as if the players were on a film set where a centuries-old story was about to unfold”(2-3). This passage requires a double act of imagination on the author’s part–how would her mother have viewed the scene and how would the rest of the world view it? Nowhere is the author herself present, which is one of her secrets of tone. She clearly has the capacity to do what Willa Cather called getting inside the skin of another person, one of the great privileges of the writer. Only the very best do this well.

The writing throughout the book shimmers with memories both spiritual and temporal. Ronald and Mary Dornn, the author’s parents, due to power struggles with the author’s uncle, left the Hutterites when Kirkby herself was only ten years old. But no bitterness corrodes the text. And what does pulsate from beginning to end is love of place, community practices, and individual people. Rich in sensory detail, the book envelopes the reader; descriptions of food will make you hungry, of long church services will make your back ache, and of storytelling will make you want to join the circle.

I hope the author decides to tell the story of how she became an award-winning storyteller on Canadian television, because it seems impossible that someone with her background found a way into television, a communication medium forbidden to Hutterites.

This book was self-published before Thomas Nelson picked it up. It has sold very well, and its literary merits have been extolled. As I turn to writing my own memoir this year, I will have a model worthy of emulation.

Have you ever met a Hutterite, visited a Hutterite community? This is the longest-lived communal group in the western world. Appropriately, the memoir begins with this biblical quotation from Acts 2: 44-45: “And all that believed were together, and had all things in common; and sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need.” Marx, Engels, and Mao had a secular version of this vision which today is in great disarray. Yet Hutterite communities continue to prosper. Thoughts?

Ervin Stutzman, the current executive director of the Mennonite Church USA, gave himself an interesting memoir challenge: “How can I write the story that includes my own life (described in the third person) but is focused on my mother?”

Third-person autobiographies have appeared before. Henry Brooks Adams, grandson of John Quincy Adams, may have written the most famous one–The Education of Henry Adams.

Perhaps the category that best fits this book is neither memoir nor autobiography, but rather family history. Memoirist and memoir coach Virginia Lloyd recently offered five defining distinctions between the genres in this post on Lynette Benton’s blog.

I was curious enough about this choice that I asked the author a few questions. He graciously agreed to answer them below.

Q: Who was the audience you envisioned for this book (and a companion family history called Tobias)?

A: At first I chose to publish with Cascadia Press, who edited the book. When Cascadia editor Michael King went to co-publish with Herald Press, they bought the rights to publish it themselves. I envisioned a largely Anabaptist(Mennonite and Amish) audience, although it has sold much more broadly than that. Some of the most interested individuals were other-than-Mennonite. They write me on Facebook or contact me by email.

Q: What were the concerns you had as you thought about writing the book (s)? Did other people caution you against doing so?

Ervin Stutzman, Executive Director, Mennonite Church USA

A: My main concern at first was that not many people would be interested. But I soon learned that many people were interested. I don’t recall that anyone cautioned me against writing.

Q: Did you fear that telling the story of your father’s financial challenges and your mother’s struggles as a widow would be a problem for you or members of your family?

A: I never struggled with fear–except perhaps in the case of my father’s business dealings. But I decided that telling the truth about our family was more important than keeping a particular reputation. That turned out to be one of the most formative experiences in my life, and gives me courage to speak the truth in many other ways in the church. I don’t worry too much about what people think, so I am bolder now. People tell me they notice it.

Q: It seems challenging to put yourself into the story without becoming a major character. I am fascinated by my awareness of your presence–or not–as you tell the story. How many scenes came from direct observations you remember and how many came from stories your mother or others told you?

A: In Tobias, I depended entirely on the stories of others, since I could not draw on a single memory. In Emma, I drew from much more personal knowledge, but I tried to write from my mother’s point of view rather than my own. Even so, 2/3 of the book is from other sources such as my sister’s diaries and journals. I also drew from many interviews with siblings, uncles/aunts, and others who knew her well.

To get feedback and buy in for the project, I shared the manuscript of both of my books with all my siblings and all of my mother’s and father’s siblings.

Q: Who/what was the major source of memory for you? How did you access your memories and get others to do the same.

A: I soon learned that story invokes story. I could ask individuals if they remembered anything about my father, and they had very little to say. But when I told them a few stories, it prompted many other memories and stories. And after I published the books, I got some of the best stories. I have recorded those in dozens of pages in my journal.

From various sources, I created a timeline that ran to 48 pages for each of my boxes. This helped me to keep the time chronology in order. I drew from diaries, newspapers, as well as many interviews.

Q: Have you encountered any hurt or opposition in your family after the book was published? While you were writing? How did/do you handle it?

A: I have not encountered any hurt and very little opposition. In fact, this project has been one of the most helpful projects to unite our family. All of the members of my family are enthusiastic about these two books. My oldest brother, who was not close to me, often thanks me for the work I have done for our family. My sister-in-law wrote me a letter telling me that Tobias of the Amish is the best thing that ever happened to her husband.

One of my uncles has not been enthused about my book Tobias. I think that’s because it does not paint his father, my grandfather, in a very positive light. He told me that everything in the book is true, but that I would not have had to write it all. It is because of his influence that the local bookstore in Hutchinson, Kansas stocks the book, but does not display it on the shelf.

Q: You have always been a very busy person. How did you find the time to write? What was your discipline?

A: I am a fairly disciplined person, so I subdivided these large book projects into a smaller series of many projects. For example, I made many lists, such as 1) cars or equipment we owned, 2) places we visited, 3) family traits or verbal expressions, 4) furniture or appliances, 5) the rhythms of the day, the week and the year, and 6) activities and artifacts in the various rooms in the house, the garden, the butcher house, the barn, the church house, etc. I also made lists of animals and plants, along with a variety of weather conditions.  I visualized all of these in my mind’s eye as I wrote. I also conducted a photo harvest in my home community. Each of these activities was a project in itself, and they prepared me to write in a more full-orbed way.

I have learned that all I need to keep making progress is to visualize the next physical or mental step that will move me toward the ultimate goal of publishing the book. That might be as simple as reading 20 pages of a diary, scheduling an interview, drawing up a list, or writing a paragraph that I know will be revised. All of these activities are more productive than allowing my psychic RAM to cycle endlessly with a blank page in front of me. All of them help to overcome “the power of the white (page).”

I integrated lots of interviews with people in different communities into my travel schedule for the church. I also scheduled times to write, whether I felt like it or not. Sometimes I took a week of vacation, which was very “expensive” in terms of commitment. I tried to make it pay by carefully planning my time. For example, it took me two weeks of vacation to search through all the copies of the Sugar Creek Budget from 1918-1956 that gave me information about Hutchinson, Kansas; Nowata and Thomas, Oklahoma, and Kalona, Iowa. I read 11 years worth of my sister’s diaries by scheduling this activity over a period of time.

I wrote an extensive chronology and plot development scheme for both books before I wrote the narrative. Some of the hardest work that I did was to envision my mother’s fatal flaw, and how she overcame it. I came to see the development in her life, which was hidden to me as I was growing up. Now I revel in the feedback from widows who tell me that I really described well what my mother was going through. Again, I tried to capture the ethos of my parent’s community by a simple and restrained writing style.

Had I simply starting writing out of my limited memory, it wouldn’t have been much of a story. My research added depth and breadth to the plot as well as the descriptions. And of course, I discovered much more than I could put into the book. In fact, I cut out more than 50 pages in the last draft of Emma, just to keep it focused and short enough for people to read.

Q: Did you find “flow” easily after you got started writing? Did your energy and attention sometimes wane? What did you do then?

A: I can really get into the flow when I get started. At times when my energy waned, I talked to people about my project. They expressed enthusiasm for it, which gave me new energy. Few things energized me like learning new stories from people.

Q: Did you do a book tour? Participate in any other marketing events?

A: I have spoken to groups about one or both of these books in Harrisonburg, Virginia; Sarasota, Florida; Lancaster, Pennsylvania; Walnut Creek, Ohio; Hutchinson, Kansas; Kalona, Iowa; Laurelville, Pennsylvania; Palm Springs, California; and Middlebury, Indiana, always to receptive audiences.

When people ask me if I enjoy writing, I tell them that I enjoy having written. There is a difference.

Which do you enjoy more–writing or having written?

Have you ever read (or written) a third-person memoir or family history?

Do you have any further questions for Ervin Stutzman?

Caldwell, Bo. City of Tranquil Light. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2010.

If Barbara Kingsolver’s masterpiece The Poisonwood Bible, has formed your image of Christian missionaries in the twentieth century, you need an equal and opposite set of characters to round out (not replace) your historical, theological, and literary imagination. Bo Caldwell’s Will and Katherine Kiehn are not as dramatic as Kingsolver’s Nathan and Orleanna Price, but their quiet faith, love of their adopted country, and devotion to each other will stir all but the most callous readers. If you are immune to quietness as a form of passion and simplicity as beauty, beware. Otherwise, you are in for a treat. This is a great book.

The narrator of this tale, Will Kiehn, is an unlikely hero—clumsy, slow, sometimes lazy—by his own confession. A Mennonite farm boy from Oklahoma, he is so humble that he thinks his biggest sin is pride. Having heard a clear call to go to China, he leaves his home and family and joins a company of other missionaries, including Katherine Friesen, the 22 year-old deaconess he will later marry.

The book opens in the 1960’s with an elderly Kiehn in a California retirement community, reflecting over his past, remembering a place—Kuang P’ing Ch’eng—City of Tranquil Light. A widower, he cherishes his Chinese bible, his German bible (the language of his parents), and his wife’s journal chronicling their 27 years as missionaries. An encounter with a Chinese-American Fuller brush man who recognizes him as “mu shih”—“shepherd-teacher” who baptized him in China—sets the stage for the opening chapters describing his religious heritage and his Mennonite formation on the plains of Oklahoma.

The scene then shifts to the year 1906, when both Will and Katherine set sail for China. We follow them through their introductory culture shock, to their demure courtship, quiet marriage, and their post as the only westerners in Kuang P’ing Ch’eng. Will narrates in the past tense while excerpts from Katherine’s journal offers a contrasting immediacy of the same scene in real time. Her italicized words bring her to life as her own character, full of vivacious energy even though she suffers from headaches and low physical stamina. She nevertheless applies her medical skills to the amazement and gratitude of villagers. Will learns to preach. And slowly a church begins to form.

In the midst of early success comes the greatest blessing of all—a daughter named Lily. The plot of the novel pivots around the death of Lily and the fact that medical supplies that could have cured her dysentery were stolen by a bandit named Hsiao Lao who then continues to enter and exit their lives through wars, famines, floods, and other near-death experiences. The book concludes after Katherine’s death, when Will’s mind returns to the remembered deepest places in his soul. His room in the retirement home is on the west side—the one closest to China.

Faith is the most obvious theme of this book. Will and Katherine both learn the lesson early in their sojourn that China will not bend toward them. They need to listen and bend toward China, trusting God to be wiser than they are. They do so gracefully, usually, and with difficulty at other times. Their church grows, not from hellfire preaching but the same way Jesus grew his motley band of followers—through the telling of stories and ministry to human need. Menno Simons, for whom the Mennonite church was named, said these words:

True evangelical faith cannot lie dormant.
It clothes the naked.
It feeds the hungry.
It comforts the sorrowful.
It shelters the destitute.
It serves those that harm it.
It binds up that which is wounded.

Will and Katherine lived this kind of evangelism; they applied to missions the first rule of medicine: first, do no harm.

But this is not a theological tract or a short course in up-to-date missiology. Caldwell’s vision stretches beyond admiration for faithful simplicity and for storytelling about the adventures of ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. She connects the lives of Will and Katherine with a life force that emanates from the land, with memory older than time, and with the great traditions in literature.

On nearly every page of this book lie traces of another great book. The simple conversion story when Will kneels beside the plow in his field contains echoes of St. Augustine, e.e.cummings,   Francis Thompson, St. Paul, and Gerard Manley Hopkins. When Will’s father, who might have been angry to see his son leave the farm, instead embraces him, saying “you have chosen the better part. How could I refuse you?” he is the archetypal good father, echoing the words of Jesus himself in Luke 10:42 “Mary has chosen the better part, which shall not be taken away from her.”

The two books that came to my mind most often when reading this one were Willa Cather’s Death Comes for the Archbishop and Marilynn Robinson’s Gilead. In addition to quiet mystical experience of their main characters, these novels all root their deepest spiritual lessons in the power of place. Will describes how this kind of love penetrates:

“Each morning when I begin my daily walk, I start out by heading west, toward China. At times my life there seems almost imagined; bandits and soldiers and magistrates, floods and droughts and famines and war, seem as distant as the moon. On other days it is the present that feels imagined and Kuang P’ing Ch’eng that seems more real than the poached egg and toast I eat for breakfast. Certain smells make China instantly real to me: anything cooked with garlic, freshly cut wood, antiseptic, the crispness of the air on the first autumn day. These scents stop me in my tracks.”

As he kneels by his bed at night, in a scene reminiscent of  his conversion years ago in an Oklahoma field, he gives thanks for his parents and for Katherine and Lily, working his way from the names of his Chinese friends to the City of Tranquil Light itself and then to the country where he can no longer go. As his heart settles on China, he feels a familiar homesickness, a gift that tells him this earth is not his home.

Joseph Conrad and Barbara Kingsolver took us to the heart of darkness. Bo Caldwell arouses the hope, even the conviction, that beyond darkness of all kinds lies a heavenly city—a city of tranquil light.

Edith Virginia Rhodes Showalter, R.I.P.

First posted on August 31, 2008 at 11:30am

Stuart’s mother Edith died this morning at 5 a.m. We are making plans now to travel to Virginia. She was 87 years old and was living in a nursing home, having suffered a series of mini-strokes beginning a decade ago.

She left no memoir. She was one of the “salt of the earth” people whose legacy is not in money, or in words, but in the fleeting arts–the art of rearing children, cleaning a house, gardening, sewing, making fabulous meals, volunteering in church and community. She shared most of Owen Showalter’s dreams and helped make many of them possible–to live peacefully and honorably, to move the family to Ohio and then back to Virginia, to own a farm, to build a house on a hill in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley.

She left gifts of her own making as a lasting legacy. Every time Stuart and I came to visit, from 1969, when we married, to 1998, when she had her first stroke, there was a new quilt in the frame. We have one blue and white cross-stitched one on the guest bed and another in the cedar chest. She was neither a great reader or a great writer–with eight children, when would she have had the time?– but she did send cards and notes. They always began “Dear Ones,” a lovely phrase that I continue to use with our children. She stitched baby quilts for the grandchildren and had a new afghan ready for every high school graduate.

Edith Virginia Rhodes Showalter was my window into the Old-Order Mennonite World. Her family and church looked a lot like the Amish — to outsiders, at least. She grew up with horses and buggies instead of cars and trucks. She only learned to drive a car only after she was married and had left the Old Order church to join her husband Owen’s less restrictive Virginia Conference Mennonites. She never felt comfortable behind the wheel. Yet, her seventh-grade education took her further in life than Ph.D.’s do for some other folks.

The picture below, probably taken close to her wedding day, shows her before she joined the church and added a white covering on top of the bun.

Edith Virginia Showalter

What Edith did best was show her children, family, and friends love in action. A famous song to a virtuous woman described in Proverbs 31 describes her very well. The rhythms of the King James English help create a vivid picture of who she was:
10 Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies.
11 The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil.
12 She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life.
13 She seeketh wool, and flax, and worketh willingly with her hands.
14 She is like the merchants’ ships; she bringeth her food from afar.
15 She riseth also while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household, and a portion to her maidens.
16 She considereth a field, and buyeth it: with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard.
17 She girdeth her loins with strength, and strengtheneth her arms.
18 She perceiveth that her merchandise is good: her candle goeth not out by night.
19 She layeth her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff.
20 She stretcheth out her hand to the poor; yea, she reacheth forth her hands to the needy.
21 She is not afraid of the snow for her household: for all her household are clothed with scarlet.
22 She maketh herself coverings of tapestry; her clothing is silk and purple.
23 Her husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land.
24 She maketh fine linen, and selleth it; and delivereth girdles unto the merchant.
25 Strength and honour are her clothing; and she shall rejoice in time to come.
26 She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of kindness.
27 She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness.
28 Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her.
29 Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all.
30 Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the LORD, she shall be praised.
31 Give her of the fruit of her hands; and let her own works praise her in the gates.

Showalter siblings surround their mother

After a lifetime of seeking, and rising, and girding, and holding, and stretching, and reaching, and making, she had a disabling stroke. The last family picture, taken soon after the death of her husband Owen, features the seven sons (Harley, Frank, Stuart, Ruel, Hollis, Welby, Myron) and one daughter (Sharon) arranged around her wheelchair.

As I reflected on her life this morning, I thought about the blessing of having had two mothers. My own mother is a Mary, who loves to read, write, dream, imagine. Edith was a Martha, in the mold of the virtuous woman above. Sometimes these two archetypal woman, the dreamer and the doer, fight a war inside my heart. But I am so glad I have known and loved both of them deeply.