If I Live to Be 100: Lessons from the Centenarians

FROM OUR EDITORS

Neenah Ellis spent an unforgettable year interviewing centenarians for NPR's celebration "100 Years of Stories." In this life-enhancing book, she introduces us to many indelible characters: a couple who courted by horse and sleigh in the winter of 1918; a renowned expert on dyslexia who published a book at 96; and a not-quite-shameless 103-year-old skinny-dipper who confides that she indulges her passion only "when it's foggy and there's no fishermen around."

FROM THE PUBLISHER

If I Live to Be 100 is a remarkable book, beautifully written and elegantly wise, that takes us inside the world of the very old and invites us to learn from them firsthand the art of living well for an exceptionally long period of time.

Neenah Ellis always wanted to live to 100, and her fascination led her to interview centenarians from all over the country about what life was like at the very beginning of the century, and how things have changed over time. Ellis, a producer for National Public Radio, spent an unforgettable year traveling with her tape recorder and listening to the stories of America's oldest men and women. She met a couple who courted by horse and sleigh in Vermont during the winter of 1918, and she spent a week with the oldest living black lesbian in America. She visited a nationally known expert on dyslexia who published a book at 96 and whose great-great-grandfather was a colonel in Washington's army; and she met Anna Wilmot, the row-boating centenarian from New England who captured the hearts of thousands of NPR listeners with her confession that she swims in the buff only “when it's foggy and there's no fisherman around.”

Originally conceived as an American history project, Ellis's year of interviews became much more, a personal journey of growth and transformation. After two decades of acting as the reporter and inquisitor, Ellis finally shifted gears and was able in the process of these conversations to start really listening. Once she had put away the exigencies of her cusp-of-the-millennium life—her deadlines, the intense focus on current events, the endless e-mail and ringing phones —she began to learn the kinds ofthings that we do from much older people. She started to connect in her conversations with them, and to see the virtue of looking forward, as the centenarians did, not backward. They reminded her that the moment—this very moment that we're in right now—is precious and fine. And that the true richness of life is to be found in each other—in our marriages and friendships, in the intellectual life that we share with each other, and in the ways that we become connected. Their stories add up to a course in living well, with lessons and inspiration for all of us.

Author Biography: NEENAH ELLIS, formerly a staff producer for NPR's All Things Considered, is a freelance reporter and producer who has worked for the Discovery Channel, NPR, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, and the National Park Service. She lives with her husband, Noah Adams, in Takoma Park, Maryland.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

For the National Public Radio series One Hundred Years of Stories, broadcast two years ago, Ellis interviewed Americans at least 100 years old some of them ailing or confused in their thinking, others completely coherent, lively and full of fascinating tales from the past and insightful wisdom gleaned from a century of living. The poignancy of a prolific writer and Hollywood veteran who can't remember enough to participate in the interview is offset by a woman who lives alone, still rows her own boat and occasionally skinny-dips, and by a man who marries for the third time at 103. Ellis reveals little of her own life here, and withholds any intimate introspection when, for example, a 101-year-old law professor describes his regret at spending so much time on his work rather than having a family and points out that Ellis's childless lifestyle is similar. On the other hand, she abandons straight journalism by indulging in a long tangent about "limbic resonance," or getting absorbed in someone's telling of a story. She concludes that "emotional connection with another person is all that will make you happy," but she tells readers this rather than letting her interviewees speak for themselves. If Ellis had stuck with the subjects' own voices and fleshed out their stories in more detail, this might have been a powerful oral history of America in the 20th century. Instead, it reads like a radio show brief quotes with a few sound bites of editorialization. Agent, Jonathon Lazear. (Sept.) Forecast: National publicity, a radio campaign and NPR sponsorship and author interviews will put this book on older readers' radar. It should sell well as a gift book come the holidays. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

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