I want to write an annotation that argues with Annie Dillard’s theodicy, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. I want to argue with it because I think it says, with Leibniz, that despite the presence of evil, “this universe must be indeed better than every other possible universe” (Leibniz, 377), and that argument was parodied to great aplomb in Voltaire’s Candide. But here’s the thing: I’m not sure that anything I could write would move the argument beyond where Dillard has already taken it.

Two things must be mentioned before we continue.

Annie Dillard has written an excellent and difficult book.

That’s both things.

It is excellent because, if you take your time with it, it is impossible to not have a strong reaction —- several strong reactions, really. There are passages in this book that’ll do nothing less than blow your mind. You’ll think in ways you’ve never imagined, and thinking that way will give you a whole new perspective on the world.

For example, to explain how “the pressure of growth among animals is a kind of terrible hunger” (170), Dillard writes the following:

Look at lacewings. Lacewings are those fragile green insects with large, rounded transparent wings. The larvae eat enormous number of aphids, the adults mate in a fluttering rush of instinct, lay eggs, and die by the millions in the first cold snap of fall. Sometimes, when a female lays her fertile eggs on a green leaf atop a slender stalked thread, she is hungry. She pauses in her laying, turns around, and eats her eggs one by one, then lays some more, and eats them too (170).

If that doesn’t change your perception of the maternal instinct…

Okay, now look at that paragraph again, but this time, instead of being shocked at its content, be amazed by its style. That is another reason why this book is excellent: Dillard can write. Sometimes her writing can seem, as she says in the Afterword, “overdone” (281), but it is overdone with exuberance, with verve, and what reader doesn’t appreciate verve when it accompanies a mind of such wonder? If overdone is good for nature, then it should be good enough for (some of) our books.

Here’s what’s so excellent about that paragraph about the lacewings: it didn’t have to be written that way. Dillard could have been written, “Lacewings eat their own young.” But she didn’t. She wrote it in such a way that by the time the lacewing egg is eaten, you understand what a lacewing is and what kind of life it can look forward to, which means that by the time you get to the payoff, you’ve made some sort of emotional connection to the lacewing, and then, just when you begin to put yourself in its shoes, she tells you where this particular lacewing is and how it is feeling at this moment, and then, with your ability to empathize ratcheted all the way up, she tells you what the lacewing does, so not only do you understand the lacewing eats its young, but for just that moment, you’re doing it too.

Verve is nothing if expended on the frivolous and abstract.

Here’s the other thing: Dillard’s verve is the reason her book is difficult. When the book is great, the words move fast and deep. When it is not, it’s because the previous words have made your mind go down one channel while the current words take you down another. You become split, separate from what you’re reading on the page, and it becomes difficult to pull yourself over to where Dillard wants to take you.

But here’s the other other thing: if, during these difficult times, you just skrinkle lee and go with the flow, Dillard puts you back together.

That’s what makes arguing with her seem so pointless. Even if you don’t agree with where she ends up, you just want to thank her for giving you the experience. You don’t want to judge her. You’d rather just say with true affection, “It’s been nice talking with you,” and then go back to tending your garden.