Bird By Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life

Dance is used symbolically to represent moving through life in an artistic manner, even—or especially—in the face of adversity. Lamott quotes the Israeli-American agronomist and writer Daniel Hillel “I get up. I walk. I fall down. Meanwhile, I keep dancing” (130). Dance represents a form of perseverance. It is the ability to keep going because you are producing art. Lamott refers to her writing as a form of dancing—it is how she keeps going.

Another example of dance in Bird by Bird develops the idea of perseverance: “The great writers keep writing about the cold dark place within, the water under a frozen lake or the secluded, camouflaged hole. The light they shine on this hole, this pit, helps cut away or step around the brush and brambles; then we can dance around the rim of the abyss” (197). Here, dance appears next to unknown darkness. Dance is a way of coping with feelings of emptiness, symbolizing the experience of engaging with art.

Dance comes up again at the very end of the book. Lamott writes, “We are given a shot at dancing with, or at least clapping along with, the absurdity of life, instead of being squashed by it over and over again” (237). Dance, again, sits next to a large thing we cannot control. The absurdity of life is more jovial than the abyss. However, both represent something we have to engage with through art—consuming and/or creating art, preferably both.