In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

• Recollections of Sonora, and Especially the Río Sonora Valley
• William E. Doolittle (bio)

Introduction

“You should write a memoir of the time you spent here,” or something to this effect, said Bill Steen during our travels in the Río Sonora Valley, July 2021. My immediate thought was “Why would I do that?” But think about it I did, and soon thereafter started writing what I remembered.

The text began chronologically but soon turned into a combination of Zuihitsu, or follow-the-brush type of poetry pioneered by Sei Shōnagon in the 11th century (Keene 1999), and a stream-of-consciousness type of prose much like that of the 14th-century Shintō priest Urabe (aka Yoshida) no Kaneyoshi, more commonly known as Kenkō (1998). Kenkō’s “Notes from Leisure Hours,” were written to alleviate boredom. They are thus “a work of timeless relevance...a splendid example of Japanese meditative style” (Keene in Kenkō 1998: xvii). Such works provide insight into the nature of aesthetics, evoking the author’s appreciation of the world around her or him. Exposition of this worldly interest reflects not only the writer’s personal preferences, but also the preferences of those who have the leisure time to think of aesthetic matters (Keene in Kenkō 1998: vii). And, so I write.

My leisure time has been limited during the 44th and final year of teaching at the university level, 11 of which, including the past 4 years, as department chair. I have, however, taken a few moments now and again to jot down recollections of Sonora as they popped into mind. Often enough, I would send myself an email with a thought to be written down later. And, of course, many of these random thoughts required a [End Page 205] bit of editing of the surrounding text when I inserted them someplace other than at the end of the manuscript.

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A map of Sonora with the locations of places mentioned in the text. Cartography by Peter H. Dana.

Unlike the great, modern stream-of-consciousness writers such as William Faulkner, James Joyce, Jack Kerouac, and Virginia Woolf, I include a map (Figure 1), and 95 pictures. As the old adage goes, “A picture is worth a thousand words.” I shudder to think what this text [End Page 206] would be like without pictures; 90,000 more words, or three and a half times longer than it is, I guess. It certainly would not be as eloquent as the writing of the authors mentioned above, and indeed it is not, even with the pictures. All of the photographs, slides, and field notes I took while working in Sonora have been donated to the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Hermosillo, Sonora.

There was a time a few months into the writing process that I thought about reconsidering the format. I have travel diaries dating from 1977 to the present, and thought about restructuring the text into a chronological format. I decided against doing this, however, as the stream-of-consciousness approach was taking on a character of its very own. A history of my activities would be factual and boring. The following remarks comprise a very personal treatise, rather than a formal chronology of my experiences. My diaries will be available through the library system of the University of Texas at Austin after my death. The early ones are in both notebook and digital form; the later ones are solely digital. Until then....

My Sonoras

My first recollection of the Río Sonora Valley is driving into it at dusk during the second week of June 1977. I was driving a 1968 GMC Suburban Carryall with my wife and two sons, Billy, age five, and David, three. We were part of a four-vehicle caravan including Dick Pailes (Figure 2) in his Suburban, Dan Reff (Figure 3) driving a University of Oklahoma pickup truck, and Adrianne Rankin driving her Chevy Blazer. All of our vehicles were packed with equipment, supplies, and people. Highway 15 from Nogales to the turnoff onto Highway 14, just north of Hermosillo, was an adventure unto itself. I won...

中文翻译：

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索诺拉州，尤其是里约索诺拉河谷的回忆

以下是内容的简短摘录，以代替摘要：

• 索诺拉州，尤其是里约索诺拉河谷的回忆
• 威廉·E·杜立特 (简介)

简介_

2021 年 7 月，我们在里奥索诺拉河谷旅行时，比尔·斯蒂恩 (Bill Steen) 说道，“你应该写一本回忆录，记录你在这里度过的时光”，或者类似的东西。我的第一反应是“我为什么要这么做？” 但想想我确实这么做了，不久之后就开始写我记得的东西。

文本按时间顺序开始，但很快就变成了 Zuihitsu 或由 Sei Shōnagon 在 11 世纪开创的随笔式诗歌（Keene 1999）和意识流式散文的结合体，很像14 世纪神道教牧师浦部（又名吉田）金吉，通常被称为 Kenkō（1998 年）。Kenkō 的《闲暇笔记》是为了缓解无聊而写的。因此，它们是“一部具有永恒意义的作品……日本冥想风格的典范”（Keene in Kenkō 1998：xvii）。这些作品提供了对美学本质的洞察，唤起作者对周围世界的欣赏。对这种世俗兴趣的阐述不仅反映了作者的个人喜好，也反映了那些有闲暇时间思考美学问题的人的喜好（Keene in Kenkō 1998：七）。而且，我就是这么写的。

在大学教学的第 44 年，也是最后一年，我的闲暇时间受到了限制，其中 11 年，包括过去 4 年担任系主任的时间。然而，我时不时地花一些时间记下脑海中浮现的对索诺拉的回忆。通常，我会给自己发一封电子邮件，其中包含稍后写下的想法。当然，当我将这些随意的想法插入到手稿末尾以外的其他地方时，需要对周围的文本进行一些[结束第 205 页]的编辑。

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查看完整分辨率图 1。

索诺拉地图，标有文本中提到的地点的位置。彼得·H·达纳 (Peter H. Dana) 制图。

与威廉·福克纳、詹姆斯·乔伊斯、杰克·凯鲁亚克和弗吉尼亚·伍尔夫等伟大的现代意识流作家不同，我附上了一张地图（图 1）和 95 张图片。正如古老的格言所说，“一图胜千言”。我不禁想到如果没有图片，这篇文章[完第206页]会是什么样子；我猜，多了 90,000 个单词，或者说是实际长度的三倍半。它当然不会像上面提到的作者的写作那样雄辩，事实上也不是，即使有图片。我在索诺拉工作时拍摄的所有照片、幻灯片和实地笔记都已捐赠给位于索诺拉埃莫西约的国家人类学和历史研究所。

在写作过程的几个月后，我曾一度考虑重新考虑格式。我有从 1977 年至今的旅行日记，并考虑将文本重组为按时间顺序排列的格式。然而，我决定不这样做，因为意识流方法正在呈现出它自己的特征。我的活动历史将是真实且无聊的。以下评论是一篇非常个人化的论文，而不是我的经历的正式年表。在我去世后，我的日记将通过德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校的图书馆系统提供。早期的有笔记本和数字形式。后者完全是数字化的。直到那时....

迈索诺拉斯_ _ _

我对里奥索诺拉河谷的第一次记忆是 1977 年 6 月第二周的黄昏时分。我和妻子以及两个儿子（五岁的比利和三岁的大卫）驾驶着一辆 1968 年款 GMC Suburban Carryall。我们所在的车队由四辆车组成，其中包括驾驶 Suburban 的 Dick Pailes（图 2）、驾驶俄克拉荷马大学皮卡车的 Dan Reff（图 3）和驾驶雪佛兰 Blazer 的 Adrianne Rankin。我们所有的车辆都挤满了设备、物资和人员。从诺加利斯沿 15 号高速公路前往埃莫西约以北的 14 号高速公路岔路，这本身就是一次冒险。我赢了...