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Review: Quaker Aesthetics: Reflections on a Quaker Ethic in American Design and ConsumptionYou've heard it said: Don't judge a book by its cover. I'm here to tell you not to judge one by the subtitle either. At first glance, Quaker Aesthetics: Reflections on a Quaker Ethic in American Design and Consumption didn't seem like a page-turner. Several essays, collected and edited by Emma Jones Lapsansky and Anne A. Verplanck, cover topics like colonial portraiture, meetinghouse designs and plain dress. The essayists were looking for a uniquely Quaker style in the way that 18th-century American Quakers bought, created and fashioned their furniture, attire, homes, art and lifestyles. In an essay entitled "Quakers and High Chests: The Plainness Problem Reconsidered," Susan Garfield asks the question you've been pondering for a long time: Were the 18th-century rococo-furniture-owning Quakers hypocrites? What! You haven't been pondering that? Well, stay with her anyway because it's a fascinating ride through the lives and spirituality of these early Quakers as well as a rich exploration of what these Quakers meant by "plainness." This book is not a history of furniture and architecture. It is the story of spiritual ideas explored and explained within the lives of ordinary and fascinating people. Think of going into an attic in an old house and finding furni- ture, art, utensils and trunks of clothes. You might say to yourself, "These walls could tell stories." And that's what these essays do. They let the walls, clothes and furniture tell the stories. This book is a great recent addition to our library and I hope that you give yourself the gift of reading it. -Donnie Morehouse |