The Tao of Pooh

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I remember "The Tao of Pooh" was still selling well more than a decade after it was first published, and its charm does feel timeless. When Hoff first published The Tao of Pooh, his editor told him that it was unlikely to sell very well because it was “too esoteric to appeal to the general public. Mistakes are made—or imagined—by man, the creature with the overloaded Brain who separates himself from the supporting network of natural laws by interfering and trying too hard. And Buddha looks bitter because he thinks that life is inherently full of suffering, and people should strive to escape that suffering by cutting their physical and emotional attachments to the world. Hoff repeatedly says that those who try too hard will become confused, and the sense of this statementbecomes clear as he deftly guides the reader through his carefully-considered examples.

On that same page: "We don't need to imitate Nearsighted Science, which peers at the world through an electron microscope, hoping for answers it will never find and coming up with more questions instead. In April 2018, Hoff wrote a letter to his publisher informing them that he planned to recapture the copyright for The Tao of Pooh on December 15, 2018.

He wrote Taoism’s most important text, the Tao Te Ching, which Hoff repeatedly cites throughout The Tao of Pooh. I think of the movie drumline with this when Nick Cannon is told you don’t need to be able to read restroom to know how to use a toilet.

It’s really great fun to go someplace where there are no timesaving devices because, when you do, you find that you have lots of time. In either case, the focus should be on playing well the cards you’re dealt, not fantasizing about rummaging through the deck and picking your perfect hand.We will let a selection from the writings of Chuang-tse illustrate: Hui-tse said to Chuang-tse, "I have a large tree which no carpenter can cut into lumber. Both books brought the previously obscure philosophy of Taoism to the attention of mainstream America. Hoff examines how some of the other inhabitants of the Hundred Acre Wood embody competing schools of thought—Confucianism, Buddhism, etc.

So understand that I am somewhat sympathetic to what Hoff describes in this book, especially with regards to the shortcomings of being “clever. That being said, I don’t for a minute believe that Taoism is as simplistic as this would have you believe, but I’m willing to believe it’s a step in that direction.

Benjamin Hoff grew up in the Portland, Oregon neighborhood of Sylvan, where he acquired a fondness of the natural world that has been highly influential in his writing.