Alive, Alive Oh!: And Other Things that Matter, Diana Athill, 2016

Athill, a British publisher and editor, has added a second volume to her memoirs while in her ‘90’s.  Closing in on 98, Athill explores her earlier life in her grandparents’ gardens, her brush with motherhood which ended with a near fatal hemorrhage and miscarriage, her favorite authors (Boswell and Byron), and her experiences with fashion and early contacts with romance before focusing on her retirement home life and contemplation of approaching death.  The works of the very old (Athill, Kunitz, Grumbach) holds a fascinating mix of hope, loss, wisdom, and serenity (if one is fortunate).  As she states in her final chapter, a poem she wrote at the age of 93:  ‘Why want anything more marvelous /than what is.’