Consolations
David Whyte, a poet who writes about work and inner life, takes fifty-two everyday words and treats each one as a doorway. In short chapters that run from Alone to Work, he turns over the deeper meanings hidden inside familiar terms like anger, joy, honesty, and vulnerability. Each entry reads like a small essay you can sit with, written in language that is plain and unhurried. The book has become a quiet favorite for readers who return to it a page at a time. Nick Cave named it among his fifty favorite books on The Red Hand Files.
What you might want to know about Consolations
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
A poet takes ordinary words like alone, friendship, and heartbreak and writes a short meditation on the hidden meaning of each.
No. The book is arranged alphabetically by word, and each short chapter stands on its own, so you can dip in anywhere.
Consolations was written by David Whyte, published in 2015 by Many Rivers Press.
Consolations is 256 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Consolations takes most readers 4 to 6 hours to finish.
Consolations is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.