It's been a busy few weeks for the backlist. First, the passing of Robin Williams led to a run on my review of The Zen Path Through Depression. Then my article on Christopher Knight – "The North Pond Hermit" – trended as well. A quick Google search revealed that GQ had recently published an in-depth story about him.
The Strange And Curious Tale of the Last True Hermit is a remarkably sensitive and balanced account by Michael Finkel, the first journalist to win Christopher's trust… or at least enough of it to permit him to write a well-developed article. Reading it, I had the following thoughts:
o Apparently, Christopher really did live year-round in the Maine woods – in a tent, with no fire – for 27 years. I was not alone in doubting this part of his story; I've lived in Québec, and it's frankly difficult for me to imagine surviving even one night in the depths of that winter. In fairness, Christopher himself admits that even he barely did, sometimes. His greatest strength seems to be iron discipline, sticking to rigid protocols that allowed him, day after day, to meet critical challenges. My hat is off to him; I could never be so consistent for so long.
o As earlier accounts reported, Christopher possessed no firearms and offered no resistance when arrested. (Which didn't happen in his own camp, as I first believed, but at gunpoint, while burglarising a cabin.)
o I also predicted that we would soon learn troubling details about his saga, but this too has proven overly cynical. Though much of his past remains blank, everything released so far checks out. He really does seem to be nothing more than a guy who walked into the woods one day. (And who refuses to discuss his motivations for it.)
o He talks like the real thing. "More damage has been done to my sanity in jail, in [seven] months," he says, "than years, decades, in the woods." As a forest monk, I have no trouble believing that. And he has clear insight into his fate: "I stole. I was a thief. I repeatedly stole over many years. I knew it was wrong. Knew it was wrong, felt guilty about it every time, yet continued to do it." Believable perspective from a man who has been living in solitude; denial is a disease of the gregarious.
o It's interesting to note that in the woods he was always carefully groomed, but stopped shaving in jail. I also was more fastidious about my appearance on the mountain, in part to avoid attracting the attention of possible onlookers. Christopher claims his bushy, unkempt jail beard was a calendar; otherwise he had no way, in that barren, sterile environment, to gauge the passage of time. Again, credible.
o As it happens, he did meditate, but only when in danger. It worked, too: "I am alive and sane, at least I think I'm sane." But in spite of the article's title, Christopher isn't a true hermit. "When I came out of the woods they applied the label hermit to me," he told Finkel. "Then I got worried. For I knew with the label hermit comes the idea of crazy." (An impression that is totally accurate.) He was in fact a recluse: a person who lives in isolation for non-spiritual reasons.
o Mental health examiners suggest that Christopher may have Asperger's syndrome. Speaking as someone with close experience of this condition (think Sheldon on The Big Bang Theory), it's plausible. He was often cold, unresponsive, and impatient with Finkel; he sometimes voiced a high opinion of himself and disparaged perceived rivals – even famous confrère Henry David Thoreau – in adolescent terms. Tics not likely produced by three decades of solitude, which tends on the contrary to make difficult people (such as me) more friendly, loving, and mindful of others' worth.
o Another detail that may be counter-intuitional to the inexperienced: his camp turned out to be almost within sight of a cabin; isolation and distance are not always synonymous. He lived in a state of camouflage, just as I planned to do when I thought I'd have to sit my 100 Days on public land. The best defence is not to be seen in the first place.
o His difficulties with advancing age also ring true. He complained of the growing hardship of a lifestyle tailored to a man in his twenties, and shared my battle with failing eyesight, which he partially solved the same way: "I used my ears more than my eyes."
o Finally, and most fascinating, he did in fact gain profound existential insight out there, even though he wasn't a contemplative. "Solitude did increase my perception," he told Finkel. "But […] when I applied my increased perception to myself, I lost my identity. With no audience, no one to perform for, I was just there. […] To put it romantically: I was completely free." That's pretty much what happened to me, too. Interesting that Zen training apparently wasn't necessary – though it did get me there a few hundred months sooner.
Ultimately, my conviction that Christopher's story is essentially accurate as he reports it boils down to the following "Wisdom To Live By", surrendered at last to his chronicler after repeated pestering:
"Get enough sleep."
I learned the same thing, Out There.
UPDATE, 21 April 2015: The Lena Friedrich documentary on Christopher, formerly known as Hermythology, is now called The Hermit and has a Facebook page.
UPDATE, 7 July 2015: Christopher was released on parole in March. News releases quote both his attorney and the judge who decided his case as expressing confidence that he will transition smoothly back to civil life. Details here.
UPDATE, 8 March 2017: Finkel has just come out with a book about Christopher, entitled The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story Of The Last True Hermit. (Even though, as I've explained, Christopher was not in fact a true hermit.) I haven't read this book yet.
UPDATE, 15 April 2020: Lena Friedrich has made her Christopher Knight documentary available free on Vimeo.
(Photo of the Maine camp country courtesy of Wikimedia Commons and a generous photographer.)
(See my August 2014 update on Christopher here.)
Last week a man the press described as a "hermit" was arrested in Maine. As usual, the coverage was Swiss-cheesed with hanging references, and much of the rest played to stereotypes and sentiment. After concerted research, there are still great gaps in my picture of events.
But as far as I can tell, Christopher Knight is not a hermit (that is, a person who withdraws from society for spiritual ends). He appears instead to be a recluse. I did find, in a single article, a mention of meditation, without elaboration. Aside from that, all that's clear is that Christopher lived under a tarp in the forest, for a long time. I question whether he did so for the 27 straight years he claims; there are significant holes there, too.
He survived in the bush by stealing from shuttered summer cabins. Thus, many are furious with him. Fair enough; anyone who's been burgled will tell you the damage goes much deeper than the simple cost of the goods. But as an actual hermit, I can imagine the thought process that might lead an otherwise inoffensive solitary to such a decision, especially if he's been alone a long time. Removed from human influence, you start to be shaped by other moralities. That's why we do it.
However, if he isn't a fair-dinkum hermit, Christopher may at least lean that way. Even his victims admit he mostly stole the wherewithal of life: food, fuel, bedding, batteries. He walked right past money and valuables, damaged as little as possible, and even locked up when he left. And I found a single unsupported suggestion that he left things. Payment? Apology? Aggravatingly, no particulars.
Finally, not a single mention of weapons. Not even a knife. Hell, not even a stick. (Frankly, that begins to be a bit foolhardy.)
Tellingly, law enforcement agents speak of Christopher in solicitous tones; these are not people given to the benefit of the doubt. And the fact that there has been no description of the arrest means it was undramatic. Apparently, officers just walked into Christopher's camp, cuffed him, and led him off to a cell.
But what stung me is the unhelpful and untruthful "analysis" in some press coverage. An otherwise objective Bangor Daily News article quotes one Todd Farchione, described as "a research assistant professor in the psychology department at Boston University", as literally saying that seclusion "stunts development." I got news for you, Todd: so does society. He goes on to say that Christopher's appreciation of talk radio "falls far short of personal interaction with others." Since that's also the lion's share of social interaction for many right-wingers, I guess they must be similarly "stunted".
But far his most arrogant statement is this:
“He [Christopher] might have knowledge, but he’s not going to know what it feels like to lose his first job or lose his first love, or make a mistake or suffer the pain that comes with living. He has not been living in many respects, not in a normal, socially acceptable way.”
Gizo H. Bodhisattva, where to start? Christopher doesn't know what it's like to make a mistake? Really? He doesn't know the pain of living? Out there alone, where the central nutrient of our existence, human kindness, is completely absent? But perhaps this is no problem, since he's "not been living in many respects". Farchione suggests that makes him so "socially unacceptable", he's no longer human.
Check it out, college boy: this hermit has a stick. And he's reaching for it.
Inevitably, Farchione refers to "schizoid personality disorder", which he defines as "a condition in which people lack the desire for social relationships". Yeah. The same thing is often caused by those relationships. There are plenty of sane reasons to avoid people. And unlike cultures in other times and places, this one provides no honest, sanctioned way for such renunciates to get by.
Fortunately, in the same article, Boston College psychology professor Joseph Tecce, (after a few more premature allusions to mental illness), offers a more accurate assessment of Christopher's situation. "He has not practiced the art of interacting with people," Tecce says. He suggests Christopher have a companion to sit with him as he faces the maelstrom of officialdom. "He’ll likely feel overwhelmed, and another person’s presence at his side could offer relief." That's helpful, insightful advice.
Eventually the truth will out. There will be a trial, followed by a book, and then perhaps, God forbid, a TV movie. We'll learn that Christopher's life as a recluse wasn't quite as we imagined, and that his backstory is more complex and more ambiguous than first reported. He'll become a cautionary tale about guys who live in the forest, and the righteousness of hounding them out of it again. This civilisation brooks no abstention, spiritual or otherwise.
What will not happen is any re-evaluation of the morality that Christopher found less attractive than a grinding life in the rough. In that he reminds me of the Vietnam War vets who took to the woods outside my hometown when I was a kid. Respectable folk feared and judged them, called them hippies, maniacs, and delinquents, and sometimes sent the police to hunt them down. (The first Rambo movie, filmed here on the North Coast, was inspired by those incidents.) That experience too produced no change in public morality: of war, of exploitation, of collective guilt, of anything else. Because if there's one thing The Consensus does well, it's lambasting every selfishness but its own.
I hope Christopher gets support from decent people, and that as the public learns the full texture of his tale, he bears up against the blowback. When it's all over, the Maine winter may not be the coldest thing he's survived.
UPDATE: Hermythology, a documentary about Christopher, is scheduled for release 17 July 2013. Further information is available here.
UPDATE, 15 September 2013: Christopher Knight has been sentenced under a provision that allows him to serve his time without incarceration, in a supervised programme. All things considered, a wise and sensitive decision. Details here.
UPDATE, January 2014: The Maine State Police Trooper who led the Christopher Knight investigation believes his story is accurate as told; mention of an alcohol addiction; and his reintegration is apparently going smoothly to date. Details here.
It's been a busy few weeks for the backlist. First, the passing of Robin Williams led to a run on my review of The Zen Path Through Depression. Then my article on Christopher Knight – "The North Pond Hermit" – trended as well. A quick Google search revealed that GQ had recently published an in-depth story about him.
