NOTE: This newsletter might be cut short by your email program. View it in full.   If a friend forwarded it to you and you'd like your very own newsletter, subscribe here — it's free.   Need to modify your subscription? You can change your email address or unsubscribe. Hello tech! This is a special annual edition of the Brain Pickings newsletter by Maria Popova. The regular Sunday edition will be with you predictably and reliably this weekend. If you missed the two annual specials of the year's loveliest children's books and overall favorite books, they are here and here. And if you find any value and joy in my labor of love, please consider supporting it with a donation – this year, like every year for the past thirteen, I have invested countless hours and tremendous resources in Brain Pickings, and every little bit of support helps keep it going. If you already donate: THANK YOU. The Best of Brain Pickings 2019 In this annual review, following the annual selections of the year's loveliest children's books and overall favorite books, "best" is as usual a composite measure of what I most enjoyed thinking and writing about over the course of the year, and what you most ardently read and shared. It has been curious to observe, in this most difficult year of my life, the patterns that emerge — strong women's voices, the healing power of nature, of poetry, and of kindness; the necessity of unselfish love, of friendship, and of solitude; and lots and lots and lots of tress — and how they illuminate the things that help me, and perhaps you, survive. Thrive, even. Enjoy, and may we face the coming year with the steady serenity of a tree — that supreme lover of light, always reaching both higher and deeper, rooted in a network of kinship and ringed by a more patient view of time. The More Loving One: Astrophysicist Janna Levin Reads W.H. Auden's Sublime Ode to Our Unrequited Love for the Universe Read It/ 13 Life-Learnings from 13 Years of Brain Pickings Read It/ The Healing Power of Gardens: Oliver Sacks on the Psychological and Physiological Consolations of Nature Read It/ Hannah Arendt on Love and How to Live with the Fundamental Fear of Loss Read It/ Trees at Night: Stunning Rorschach Silhouettes from the 1920s Read It/ I Like You: An Almost Unbearably Lovely Vintage Illustrated Ode to Friendship Read It/ Kahlil Gibran on Silence, Solitude, and the Courage to Know Yourself Read It/ After Silence: Amanda Palmer Reads Neil Gaiman's Stunning Poem Celebrating Rachel Carson's Legacy of Culture-Shifting Courage Read It/ Salvation by Words: Iris Murdoch on Language as a Vehicle of Truth and Art as a Force of Resistance to Tyranny Read It/ Rebecca Solnit's Lovely Letter to Children About How Books Solace, Empower, and Transform Us Read It/ Planting Trees as Resistance and Empowerment: The Remarkable Illustrated Story of Wangari Maathai, the First African Woman to Win the Nobel Peace Prize Read It/ Rachel Carson's Bittersweet Farewell to the World: Timeless Advice to the Next Generations from the Woman Who Catalyzed the Environmental Movement Read It/ Hermann Hesse on Solitude, the Value of Hardship, the Courage to Be Yourself, and How to Find Your Destiny Read It/ "Little Prince" Author Antoine de Saint-Exupéry on Losing a Friend Read It/ Leo Tolstoy on Kindness and the Measure of Love Read It/ On Children: Poignant Parenting Advice from Kahlil Gibran Read It/ Middle Age and the Art of Self-Renewal: An Extraordinary Letter from Pioneering Education Reformer Elizabeth Peabody Read It/ The Lost Words: An Illustrated Dictionary of Poetic Spells Reclaiming the Language of Nature Read It/ The Fascinating Science of How Trees Communicate, Animated Read/watch It/ Harriet Hosmer on Art and Ambition: The World's First Successful Woman Sculptor on What It Takes to Be a Great Artist Read It/ Is There a God? Stephen Hawking Gives the Definitive Answer to the Eternal Question Read It/ Year of the Monkey: Patti Smith on Dreams, Loss, Love, and Mending the Broken Realities of Life Read It/ Amanda Palmer Reads "When I Am Among the Trees" by Mary Oliver Read It/ The Astronomical Art of Maria Clara Eimmart: Stunning 17th-Century Drawings of Comets, Planets, and Moon Phases by a Self-Taught Artist and Astronomer Read It/ You Can't Have It All Read It/ My Heart: An Emotional Intelligence Primer in the Form of an Uncommonly Tender Illustrated Poem About Our Capacity for Love Read It/ donating=loving In 2019, the 13th year of Brain Pickings, I poured tremendous time, thought, love, and resources into this labor of love, which remains free and is made possible by patronage. If you found any joy and solace here this year, please consider supporting it with a donation. And if you already donate, from the bottom of my heart: THANK YOU. monthly donation You can become a Sustaining Patron with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a Brooklyn lunch.   one-time donation Or you can become a Spontaneous Supporter with a one-time donation in any amount.   You're receiving this email because you subscribed on Brain Pickings. This weekly newsletter comes out on Sundays and offers the week's most unmissable articles. Brain Pickings NOT A MAILING ADDRESS 159 Pioneer Street Brooklyn, NY 11231 Add us to your address book unsubscribe from this list   update subscription preferences