Grace Notes: The Waking of a Woman's Voice - Heidi Hart

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Résumé :
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN a trained singer who grew up in a house of vowels finds that her voice is not her own? What happens when a woman loses the Mormon faith of her childhood and abandons the rituals she's always known? What does a woman, already married for thirteen years by her early thirties, do when she realizes she has been lying for years? How does one sing, with grace, from the heart? In the spirit of Mary Catherine Bateson's Composing a Life and Kathleen Norris's Cloister Walk, Heidi Hart's luminous memoir retraces her search for an opening to her heart's path. She finds that the religious life of her Latter-day Saint family--which includes a revered General Authority--robs her of her voice and her spirit. When she discovers Catharine, a mute Quaker ancestor, Hart begins a vital journey--a journey blessed by her devout and devoted husband; a journey that leads her to study Zuni mythology, Jewish tradition, Benedictine monastic ritual, Emily Dickinson, and Saint Hildegard of Bingen--a journey that leads her, finally, to a place that feels like home: the company of Friends, the Quaker community of Salt Lake City. With grace and lyricism, Hart shares the private, personal wisdom she has earned in her community of friends, a community that embraces silences and dissonance, a place where she can't keep from singing.