Who I am.

I write about the landscape of grief, nature, and the wisdom of fools. The author of four books, my essays, poems, and reviews have been published in over 50 journals, including in the Huffington Post and Colorado Review. I’ve won the River Teeth Nonfiction Book Award, the Chautauqua and Literal Latte’s essay prizes, and my work has been nominated for four Pushcart Prizes and named a notable by Best American Essays. My account of hiking in Yosemite to deal with my wife’s death, Mountains of Light, was published by the University of Nebraska Press. http://www.markliebenow.com.

Wednesday, September 7, 2016

Labyrinth of the First Death

Inspector Morse

The members of grief’s subculture don’t always want superficial diversions to fill the empty hours, even though many of our days are ponderously heavy and shaded charcoal gray. Sometimes we want to dive into our chaos in intelligent and thoughtful ways. The Inspector Morse mystery series on PBS helped me do this.

* If you would like to read the rest of this post, let me know and I’ll send it to you. *


(This is part of an essay that was first published by Back Road Café, London, U.K.)

2 comments:

  1. I recorded as many episodes of Inspector Morse as I could find when my dear Jim died two years ago. We had already watched a lot of them together. Morse has a vulnerability that is very appealing to me, and crosswords, classical music and beer were important aspects of my life with Jim. The beautiful theme music was composed by a fellow Australian, Barrington Pheloung, and there are elements of Morse Code in it. (I came here from the WYG Alumni group.)

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    1. Annie, I wondered about the Morse code! Yes, his vulnerability. Confronting the darkness of the world, trying to do what was right, and somehow make it through another day. Often enough I find myself humming the theme music, and missing Morse again.

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