Hermits around the web – Hermitary
news, sites, and pages of interest about hermits and solitude
This brief Sept. 2007 New York Times article entitled “My Life as a Hermit” by Edward Lewine was placed in the newspaper’s real estate section because of its focus on hermits trying to find suitably inexpensive places to live.
URL:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/09/realestate/keymagazine/
909HSHERMIT-t.html?ref=keymagazine
A report of a talk given in China by Bill Porter (pseudonym, Red Pine) author of Road to Heaven: Encounters with Chinese Hermits. URL: http://www.china.org.cn/english/Books&Magazines/228558.htm
See also a previous entry (2004) on Bill Porter.
URL: https://hermitary.com/around/?p=47
Here are a couple of news items about Laurel O’Neal, a Catholic convert, professed nun, and canonical hermit living in California. URLs:
http://www.contracostatimes.com/ci_7117217
http://www.catholicvoiceoakland.org/07-09-17/front2.htm
Wilderness survival skills have always struck the American imagination. In recent times, authentically skilled figures like Appalachian wilderness expert Eustace Conway are rare, and he is not reluctant to share his story and his vision with a critical public. But taking advantage of American fascination with wilderness heroes was 43 year old Joseph Knowles, who in 1913 published a book about his Maine wilderness adventure that year titled Alone in the Wilderness. The problem was that the alleged adventure was fake.
A Boston newspaper had promoted the adventure for publicity, but another exposed the hoax. Knowles had spent the two months stint in the woods not as a survivalist but in the comfort of a cozy cabin.
Knowles soon set out for the West to repeat the adventure in Oregon. Again there was controversy about verifying what he had done, though no newspapers picked up the story. A third attempt back in New York fizzled in interest. Joe Knowles returned West, to Washington State, where he spent the rest of his life as a modest artist who refused to discuss his wilderness exploits.
Among web resources on Joseph Knowles is an article in American Heritage (URL: http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/ah
/1981/3/1981_3_60.shtml) and another from the Trivia Library (URL: http://www.trivia-library.com/a/
naturalist-and-enviornmentalist-joe-knowles-part-1.htm
A new film by Canadian producer Amy Goldberg is being screened: “Willard, The Hermit of Gully Lake.” The documentary film is described succinctly on the film website:
In the 1940’s American-born Willard (Kitchener) MacDonald jumped his troop train heading to WWII. Fearing authorities he lived as a hermit deep in the northern wilderness of Nova Scotia, Canada for more than 60 years. This is the true story of “The Hermit of Gully Lake,” a man who lived a life that the rest of us could never endure. He was a soul in exile and yet you will discover that he touched the lives of so many, in ways that no one can really explain.
The film website includes a trailer.