Knitting in Hard Times

Knitting Through It, edited by Lela Nargi. Voyageur Press.

Anyone who's been a knitter for very long probably knows that knitting can be a great comfort, and not just in the comfort provided by the garments that we knit. Lela Nargi looks at the idea of using knitting to soothe your soul in her edited collection Knitting Through It.

The book includes contemporary essays about knitting through presidential election returns and the breakup of relationships, crocheting in prison and using knitting to help with quitting smoking. There are also excerpts from interviews from the Federal Writers' Project undertaken during the Great Depression and other historic records involving knitting through war, poverty, harsh working conditions and more.

Reading this book, too, reminds knitters that we are not alone in the world, and that through the years we've all knit for reasons that are often deeper than making a new garment. Read it when you're going through a difficult life change -- or share it with another knitter who is -- and you may just find yourself running to your needles.