By DAVID L. ULIN [Los Angeles Times] – Earthquakes are the expression of a living planet, the earth’s way of re-inventing itself. But while this knowledge may be consoling in the abstract, it’s not very useful in the face of a catastrophe such as last week’s quake and tsunami in Japan. At these times, we need real consolation: food and water, emergency services and rescue … and, David L. Ulin suggests, literature. Ulin is the author of The Myth of Solid Ground: Earthquakes, Prediction and the Fault Line Between Reason and Faith.
For as long as we have experienced seismicity, we have written about it, going back to the Book of Acts. Below are nine works (one for each of this most recent earthquake’s points of magnitude) that channel both our terror and our awe.
“The Earthquake in Chile” by Heinrich von Kleist.
“The Flutter of an Eyelid” by Myron Brinig.
“The Folklore of Earthquakes” by Carey McWilliams.
“Ask the Dust“by John Fante.
“Quake” by Rudolph Wurlitzer.
“Monster in a Box” by Spalding Gray.
“Annals of the Former World” by John McPhee.
“Five Fires: Race, Catastrophe, and the Shaping of California” by David Wyatt.
“After the Quake” by Haruki Murakami.
Continued, with commentary, at the Los Angeles Times | More Chronicle & Notices.
