Running, Eating, Thinking: A Vegan Anthology

by Martin Rowe

In recent years, endurance athletes, bodybuilders, and long-distance runners such as Ruth Heidrich, Scott Jurek, Rich Roll, Brendan Brazier, Robert Cheeke, and many others have destroyed the notion that you cannot be a top-flight competitor on a plant-based diet and upended the stereotype that veganism means weakness, placidity, and passivity. But are there deeper connections between veganism and running, for example, that reach beyond attaining peak performance to other aspects of being vegan: such as living lightly on the land, caring for other-than-human life, and connecting to our animal bodies?

The fifteen writers in Running, Eating, Thinking wager that there are, and they explore in manifold ways how those connections might be made. From coping with cancer to reflecting on the need of the confined animal to run free, from Buddhist ideas of nonviolence to harnessing the breath for singing and running, and from extolling the glories of lentils to committing oneself to the long run in animal activism, Running, Eating, Thinking is a pioneering anthology that may redefine your thinking about veganism and running.

Featuring:
Gene Baur
Catherine Berlot
JL Fields
Matt Frazier
Christine Frietchen
Cassandra Greenwald
Gordon Harvey
Ellen Jaffe Jones
James McWilliams
Lisette Oropesa
Colleen Patrick-Goudreau
Kimatni Rawlins
Martin Rowe
Jasmin Singer
Scott Spitz
and with a Foreword by Paul Shapiro

Genres: Vegan, Nonfiction, Health, Sports

202 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 18, 2014

About the author

I am a graduate in English literature and language from Oxford and in religious studies from NYU. In 1999, I co-founded Lantern Books, a publisher of books on vegetarianism, animal advocacy, spirituality, and natural healing. It is now Lantern Publishing & Media, a non-profit publishing company.

I founded a monthly magazine Satya, and was its editor for five and a half years. In 1999, I published The Way of Compassion: Vegetarianism, Environmentalism, Animal Advocacy, and Social Justice. In 2003, I published my novel Nicaea: A Book of Correspondences with Lindisfarne Books.

I'm the co-author of Right Off the Bat: Baseball, Cricket, Literature, and Life; The Polar Bear in the Zoo: A Speculation; The Elephants in the Room: An Excavation; and (with Ruth Heidrich), Lifelong Running. Most recently, I have authored a satirical epic-poem, The Trumpiad, and the poem The Animals Are Leaving Us (with photos by Jo-Anne McArthur). I am also the librettist for a song-cycle (music by Mihoko Suzuki) called And the Hummingbird Says.

Reviews

[Martin Rowe · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm the editor and publisher of this anthology, and I thought I'd say a few words about why I wanted to bring it into the world. I'm a runner and I'm a vegan, and over the last few years I've begun to think (!) about how these two activities/lifestyles/modes of being might be related—beyond the fact that both offer ways to live healthfully. I was very inspired way back by a 1992 anthology called COOKING, EATING, THINKING, edited by Duane Curtin and Lisa Heldke, which was published at the very outset of a burgeoning interest in what might be loosely called "the philosophy of food." The anthology, by its own admittance, was speculative and incomplete, and yet it made a contribution. RUNNING, EATING, THINKING is the same: thought-provoking, occasionally tendentious, and yet always, I believe, heartfelt and genuinely lived. I hope this volume will inspire people to run or to go vegan—or both—in a manner that is conscious and reflective and extends beyond wanting to be healthy in mind and body (laudable goal though that is). I also deliberately included less-than-superhuman athletes, because I wanted to showcase ordinary people living the embodied lives of running and veganism—and to illustrate that thinking about either needn't be confined to those who have been in extremis.

[Tamara Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

A anthology composed of fifteen stories of the impact and experiences each writer has had with running. The book is divided into three sections: running, eating, and thinking.

Section one focuses on the five runners experience with running and how running has impacted their lives. Section two focuses on the importance of food and how it affects the running relationship. Section three focuses on thinking and how running helps to bring clarity to some and the community that running creates.

Reading this book is insightful, inspiring as well as reassuring. Through reading this book, the reader discovers that all runners have the same challenges with starting to run as well as finding inspiration and continuing to run.

[Lola G. · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a collection of stories written by vegan runners. The stories are all quite different and even contradict themselves at times. One writer describes becoming a vegan runner to avoid the rampant diabetes, heart disease and breast cancer in her family. Another writes about his experience being diagnosed with stomach cancer while training for ultra marathons. He too is an avid vegan and does not eat processed foods. He thinks it is misleading to tell people that they will avoid health problems simply by eating a plant based diet.
I feel like there was something missing from his story, because he writes about his 6 year old son coming to visit him from NC. There might be a lot of stress and other factors in his life that he didn't mention. I found it strange that when he was diagnosed with cancer his only thought (repeating over and over again), was that he would run again, not that he would see his son again.

Anyway, that one strange story aside, it is an okay read. It did actually get me to go running again after a long break. 3 miles. Woot.

[Rift Vegan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an impulse buy, a blog author I read had an essay in it. (JL Goes Vegan)

I don't run, and this book confirmed for me that runners are a little bit crazy. But that's okay. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed reading this book! The first couple of essays, by Gene Baur and Colleen Patrick-Goudreau, were my favorite and I'm thinking about going back and re-reading them.

[Alan Vedge · Rating 5 out of 5]

So good. Totally worth reading even if you're not vegan or not a runner. My only complaint was one essay which got a little victim-blame-y towards those who have health problems BUT that was balanced by opposing views in several of the other essays. Overall, a great read and one I'll likely reference any time I need a little inspiration.

[David Failing · Rating 4 out of 5]

The introduction RAMBLED and waxed philosophical, which wasn't what I wanted from the book. However, the essays were fantastic, and inspirational to my running.

[Matthew · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book came out right after I had started running. I had heard Martin Rowe on the "Our Hen House" podcast promoting this collection when it was released. For various reasons, mostly it's not on the free library apps, it slid down my to-read pile. Then last month, looking through things, I looked into it again. I found, sadly, that the publisher is out of business. I did some searching and found a copy available at a used seller that I shop at and finally snatched it up.

I wish I had gotten this book years ago. It's about what I've spent my last 10 years on: vegan activism, self improvement, physical activity and their philosophical intersections. This is a welcome companion to that. Although some of the writers may have a certain level notoriety, no one here is particularly famous or elite. It's a collection of runners and vegans just living their every day life as best they can. While there are miraculous health and wellness stories in here, it's very much balanced. I think it accurately presents that an active, plant-based lifestyle is great for health, but it's not a panacea.

I love this book. I'm sure I will come back to it repeatedly.