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Devouring Time: Jim Harrison, a Writer's Life
Devouring Time
is the definitive biography of Jim Harrison—one of America’s most beloved writers—and a penetrating deep dive into the life of the talent behind
Legends of the Fall
,
Dalva
, and
True North
.
Jim Harrison (1937–2016) was widely considered one of the finest voices of his generation. His twenty-one books of fiction and fourteen books of poetry influenced a generation of writers. Harrison helped to shape the course of contemporary American literature, revitalizing in particular the novella form, of which he was a recognized master.
Harrison’s literary achievements were matched only by the literary persona that he cultivated during a fecund time in American letters and in the company of a remarkable cohort of friends, writers, actors, and artists, including Thomas McGuane, Peter Matthiessen, and Jack Nicholson. Writing for magazines such as Sports Illustrated, Playboy, Esquire, and Outside in the 1970s, his journalism won him a loyal readership who reveled in his high spirits and prodigious appetites.
For all his notoriety as a writer of prose, however, poetry remained his first and longest-abiding love. He cherished his geographic remoteness from what he called the “dream coasts” of New York City and Los Angeles, preferring to hunt, fish, and drink in the backwoods bars of Michigan, Arizona, and Montana.
Based on more than one hundred original interviews and drawing upon Harrison’s collected papers, Devouring Time is the first and only literary biography of this beloved author, whose playful, irreverent, and spiritual work continues to find and delight new listeners.
Jim Harrison (1937–2016) was widely considered one of the finest voices of his generation. His twenty-one books of fiction and fourteen books of poetry influenced a generation of writers. Harrison helped to shape the course of contemporary American literature, revitalizing in particular the novella form, of which he was a recognized master.
Harrison’s literary achievements were matched only by the literary persona that he cultivated during a fecund time in American letters and in the company of a remarkable cohort of friends, writers, actors, and artists, including Thomas McGuane, Peter Matthiessen, and Jack Nicholson. Writing for magazines such as Sports Illustrated, Playboy, Esquire, and Outside in the 1970s, his journalism won him a loyal readership who reveled in his high spirits and prodigious appetites.
For all his notoriety as a writer of prose, however, poetry remained his first and longest-abiding love. He cherished his geographic remoteness from what he called the “dream coasts” of New York City and Los Angeles, preferring to hunt, fish, and drink in the backwoods bars of Michigan, Arizona, and Montana.
Based on more than one hundred original interviews and drawing upon Harrison’s collected papers, Devouring Time is the first and only literary biography of this beloved author, whose playful, irreverent, and spiritual work continues to find and delight new listeners.
558 pages, Hardcover
Published November 4, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
June 3, 2025
This book is personal for me because Jim Harrison was one of my favorite writers for a long time. He identified as a poet, but became a prolific sports writer and master of the novella. One of the main influences on his life was the writer Thomas McGuane, who got Harrison involved in fly fishing in Key West, the enclave of artist and writers in Livingston, Montana, and through his screenwriting with the film industry. Harrison began sports writing on bird hunting and fishing for Sports Illustrated and then Esquire magazine. Harrison became close friends with Jack Nicholson, and that relationship provided connections and financial support that parlayed Harrison’s work into film adaptations. The most well known of his work is Legends of the Fall, which portrays a love story where one brother brings his girl friend home to visit in Montana and she falls hard for his more handsome brother who abandons her. Harrison was known for being stubborn and struggled with severe bouts of depression fed by his alcoholism. He gained a reputation as a gourmand which impacted his health due to his heavy wine drinking and a diet that resulted in gout and diabetes. He would not have lived his life any other way, and was very much a writer’s writer and a macho personality to the maximum. Part of his depression was linked to his view of himself as an artist, and he despaired becoming commercial even though his friends did not appreciate his viewpoint of his (and their own) financial success. The other factor was being blinded in one eye as a child, and he was self conscious about his blindness. He could not manage money or file his taxes, financially support his children or stay loyal to his wife, and much of his success was due to his friends’ generosity. Harrison reminds me a great dealof the writer Walter Benjamin where he always seemed to get in his own way.
December 15, 2025
I am giving this biography four stars because Jim Harrington had a remarkable life and his writing can be superb and very enjoyable at times. (Harrison wrote over 30 works of fiction and they are uneven in quality as one might expect.) It is a life worth examining and writing about, and the author covers it in engaging detail. I did not know the full extent of Harrison's poetry writing so I intend to read that in the future. The biography itself is good but it is apparent that the author is a devoted fan and he loses his objectivity at times. Also, he says virtually nothing about Jim Harrison's questionable portrayal of young women with older men--an unrealistic/sexist age gap. The author should have explored this as it is apparent in much of Harrison's later writing in particular.
October 5, 2025
My thanks to NetGalley and Blackstone Publishing for an advance copy of of this biography that looks at one of the last great men of letters in American literature, a man of huge talent, huge skill, and huge ways of making problems for himself and others, a poet, a writer an essayist, and one that we will probably not ever see again.
The lives of writers in America seem are classified by best-selling authors, and well the rest. As a bookseller I have customers who only read those books they can find in the Sunday paper, authors with crosses next to their name for stores getting more copies than they wanted, without looking at anything else. There are genre writers, and of course some cult writers, but literature is not something people care about any more. One can understand why, as the world is kind of a nightmare. However as one who has always found solace in reading, I love to veer away from the bestsellers and go into the weeds, and in the weeds I always find great things. Jim Harrison was one of those. I discovered him more from his journalism than anything else, than his poetry and finally his fiction. Stories that seemed simple and yet were anything but. Stories that had a depth to them, a loneliness sometimes and a beauty. Jim Harrison was a big man to his detriment in both health and relationships, a man who loved life, food, writing and literature. With an abliity to match. Devouring Time: Jim Harrison, A Writer's Life by Todd Goddard is a magisterial biography of the man, and an era in literature that will never return, loaded with stories, exploits, embarrassing tales, and of course the writing, which will never be forgotten.
Jim Harrison was born in Michigan in 1937, and he never really left the Midwest no matter how far he roamed. Jim's parents were big readers, something they passed on to their children, five in number. Jim's life was changed when during a game of what could be called Doctor, a young playmate stabbed him in the eye, destroying it. Jim was changed in many ways by this incident, both physically and emotionally. Jim liked to roam, leaving college a few times to travel to San Francisco, New York and Boston, living at the poverty level but feeling like a writer. Marriage and fatherhood made him batten down and work hard, completing college, going on to graduate school, and allowing him to meet many people who would become friends, and mentors later in life. A letter to a poet earned him a book deal. The sales got him another book, and slowly a life in publishing. Jim set up a magazine, began to work on more poems, thought of books and turned to journalism so as not to have to teach college classes, something he felt he wasn't good at. Slowly his reputation began to grow, as well as his appetites in many different things.
Harrison lived his life in full and this biography really covers that. This is not a hagiography, the author is quite clear about the nasty things Harrison was up to, affairs for example. This is a real man in full, capturing the inner man and the skill he brought to the written word. All while enjoying numerous friendships and eating 37 course meals. The book is very well written, and really gets into the background and tragedies that shaped Harrison as a man and writer. For a work so comprehensive, the book reads very well, never seeming to bog down, and even in things like the politics of higher learning moves well, with interesting stories about poets having parties that sound like true bacchanal.
A very interesting look at a time in literature where words were thought to shape the future, complete with writers and egos to match. Goddard covers not only Harrison's world, but the literature around him, showing Harrison's place, influence, and even legacy. A very well-written biography on a complicated man and one I quite enjoyed.
The lives of writers in America seem are classified by best-selling authors, and well the rest. As a bookseller I have customers who only read those books they can find in the Sunday paper, authors with crosses next to their name for stores getting more copies than they wanted, without looking at anything else. There are genre writers, and of course some cult writers, but literature is not something people care about any more. One can understand why, as the world is kind of a nightmare. However as one who has always found solace in reading, I love to veer away from the bestsellers and go into the weeds, and in the weeds I always find great things. Jim Harrison was one of those. I discovered him more from his journalism than anything else, than his poetry and finally his fiction. Stories that seemed simple and yet were anything but. Stories that had a depth to them, a loneliness sometimes and a beauty. Jim Harrison was a big man to his detriment in both health and relationships, a man who loved life, food, writing and literature. With an abliity to match. Devouring Time: Jim Harrison, A Writer's Life by Todd Goddard is a magisterial biography of the man, and an era in literature that will never return, loaded with stories, exploits, embarrassing tales, and of course the writing, which will never be forgotten.
Jim Harrison was born in Michigan in 1937, and he never really left the Midwest no matter how far he roamed. Jim's parents were big readers, something they passed on to their children, five in number. Jim's life was changed when during a game of what could be called Doctor, a young playmate stabbed him in the eye, destroying it. Jim was changed in many ways by this incident, both physically and emotionally. Jim liked to roam, leaving college a few times to travel to San Francisco, New York and Boston, living at the poverty level but feeling like a writer. Marriage and fatherhood made him batten down and work hard, completing college, going on to graduate school, and allowing him to meet many people who would become friends, and mentors later in life. A letter to a poet earned him a book deal. The sales got him another book, and slowly a life in publishing. Jim set up a magazine, began to work on more poems, thought of books and turned to journalism so as not to have to teach college classes, something he felt he wasn't good at. Slowly his reputation began to grow, as well as his appetites in many different things.
Harrison lived his life in full and this biography really covers that. This is not a hagiography, the author is quite clear about the nasty things Harrison was up to, affairs for example. This is a real man in full, capturing the inner man and the skill he brought to the written word. All while enjoying numerous friendships and eating 37 course meals. The book is very well written, and really gets into the background and tragedies that shaped Harrison as a man and writer. For a work so comprehensive, the book reads very well, never seeming to bog down, and even in things like the politics of higher learning moves well, with interesting stories about poets having parties that sound like true bacchanal.
A very interesting look at a time in literature where words were thought to shape the future, complete with writers and egos to match. Goddard covers not only Harrison's world, but the literature around him, showing Harrison's place, influence, and even legacy. A very well-written biography on a complicated man and one I quite enjoyed.
November 21, 2025
I had the feeling in the first half of the book that this might be a bit pedestrian, simply marching from one book to the next, from one meal to the next. But I was completely hooked by the middle. Harrison enjoyed himself, and, yes, seemed to hang around with famous people (or did they hang around with him?), but he worked constantly. Right up to the end when he was in pain and filled with grief. And he was not afraid of going after the biggest themes, even as he grounded them in sex, food, and travel.
Goddard accepts the story that Harrison died with a pencil in his hand after finishing a last poem. Although he gives the fiction and its position in the world (particularly in France) most of the space, he is very clear that Harrison's first love, the art that shaped him, was poetry. (And I will keep this book with Harrison's poems, not with his novels) I think that the level of research here--the time spent in the archives, the interviews with many people, family and friends, who are rapidly aging and fading--assures that this will be the touchstone biography for much of the work that will follow.
It is worth stating that some have noted in their responses here that Harrison could be boorish. Because I am a part of the literary community in Michigan, I have certainly heard some of the stories. But I had several occasions to deal directly with Jim, both as a writer and as a bookseller, and I always found him gracious, often funny, and invariably polite, even to jerks who wanted to get too many books signed, books they had not bought at the bookshop where I worked. In the early 90s I published a tiny chapbook of poems about my experience at Isle Royale National Park. It was entitled "Dream of the Black Wolf." Jim came through town when I was gone, and he must have purchased a book (even though I would certainly have given him one). A few weeks later, I received a hand made card with a beautiful photo of a black wolf glued on the front, complimenting me on the poems. My first thought was, "ah, Jim, you didn't have to do that!"
Goddard accepts the story that Harrison died with a pencil in his hand after finishing a last poem. Although he gives the fiction and its position in the world (particularly in France) most of the space, he is very clear that Harrison's first love, the art that shaped him, was poetry. (And I will keep this book with Harrison's poems, not with his novels) I think that the level of research here--the time spent in the archives, the interviews with many people, family and friends, who are rapidly aging and fading--assures that this will be the touchstone biography for much of the work that will follow.
It is worth stating that some have noted in their responses here that Harrison could be boorish. Because I am a part of the literary community in Michigan, I have certainly heard some of the stories. But I had several occasions to deal directly with Jim, both as a writer and as a bookseller, and I always found him gracious, often funny, and invariably polite, even to jerks who wanted to get too many books signed, books they had not bought at the bookshop where I worked. In the early 90s I published a tiny chapbook of poems about my experience at Isle Royale National Park. It was entitled "Dream of the Black Wolf." Jim came through town when I was gone, and he must have purchased a book (even though I would certainly have given him one). A few weeks later, I received a hand made card with a beautiful photo of a black wolf glued on the front, complimenting me on the poems. My first thought was, "ah, Jim, you didn't have to do that!"
November 18, 2025
While a supremely gifted poet and author, I had an idea of what a dirtbag Harrison was in his personal life; this book confirms it.
Dazzled by whores, drugs, Hollywood-commies, pedos, perverts, perverted sexually predatory gluttons, etc., he was a confirmed user of folks, sellout and notorious scumbag. I wonder if losing his eye at eight to a girl he was 'playing doctor with' started him down a path he could retreat from. I can only imagine what prompted the girl to defend herself in such a way.
Shame that my main literary hero didn't have much in regards to virtue; pro signal-caller however. I love his stories and poems but the man himself leaves me wanting.
I guess it's no surprise. Just a continuation of themes in Raw and the Cooked:
The whole, 'I champion the poor huddled masses, the impoverished and idle', as he marinates his liver in thousand dollars bottles of wine and guzzles V.O., dusts his nasal cavity with Colombian happy powder, eats force fed goose liver like potato chips, leers after countless trollops, name drops other snobbish liberal twerps, twats and whores of Hollywood, old money dweebs, and trust fund babies - who are his buddies of gluttony - is bilious and hypocritical. That he continued to smoke around his wife is unconscionable. That she stuck with him through that bullshit along with his abundant infidelity makes me shake my head. Maybe she had her own unsavory traits that kept her there.
Thanks for the book Todd Goddard. Well written & researched. It reminds me not to examine my heroes too closely lest they start looking more like clowns than champions.
Dazzled by whores, drugs, Hollywood-commies, pedos, perverts, perverted sexually predatory gluttons, etc., he was a confirmed user of folks, sellout and notorious scumbag. I wonder if losing his eye at eight to a girl he was 'playing doctor with' started him down a path he could retreat from. I can only imagine what prompted the girl to defend herself in such a way.
Shame that my main literary hero didn't have much in regards to virtue; pro signal-caller however. I love his stories and poems but the man himself leaves me wanting.
I guess it's no surprise. Just a continuation of themes in Raw and the Cooked:
The whole, 'I champion the poor huddled masses, the impoverished and idle', as he marinates his liver in thousand dollars bottles of wine and guzzles V.O., dusts his nasal cavity with Colombian happy powder, eats force fed goose liver like potato chips, leers after countless trollops, name drops other snobbish liberal twerps, twats and whores of Hollywood, old money dweebs, and trust fund babies - who are his buddies of gluttony - is bilious and hypocritical. That he continued to smoke around his wife is unconscionable. That she stuck with him through that bullshit along with his abundant infidelity makes me shake my head. Maybe she had her own unsavory traits that kept her there.
Thanks for the book Todd Goddard. Well written & researched. It reminds me not to examine my heroes too closely lest they start looking more like clowns than champions.
December 12, 2025
Devouring Time is the definitive biography of Jim Harrison, capturing both his literary brilliance and his larger than life persona. Todd Goddard combines meticulous research with vivid storytelling, drawing on more than 100 interviews and Harrison’s own papers to illuminate the writer’s passions, influences, and complex personality. The biography is engaging, insightful, and provides both fans and new readers a nuanced understanding of one of America’s most celebrated writers.
The book succeeds not just as a chronology of Harrison’s life, but as an exploration of his creative spirit, his devotion to poetry, and the cultural impact of his fiction. Goddard balances the personal and professional dimensions, bringing Harrison’s world and his literary genius to life for readers.
The book succeeds not just as a chronology of Harrison’s life, but as an exploration of his creative spirit, his devotion to poetry, and the cultural impact of his fiction. Goddard balances the personal and professional dimensions, bringing Harrison’s world and his literary genius to life for readers.
December 24, 2025
Harrison, by far, was one of my favorite authors. I knew nothing about his life other than that fact; he was a very fine writer. The author of this biography corrected that. I now know Harrison not only as a great author but also as a poet, essayist, given to excess in drink, food or just about anything he did. By the time he got up and left whatever metaphorical table he had set, the table was empty. He drained life.
This is one of the finest biographies I've ever read and by the time I came to the end of it, I felt the loss of a close friend. I mourned losing him and I mourned being finished with reading such a fine work.
This is one of the finest biographies I've ever read and by the time I came to the end of it, I felt the loss of a close friend. I mourned losing him and I mourned being finished with reading such a fine work.
December 17, 2025
A complex guy with a fascinating story.
Lots of details about his life and writing. Personally, I wished it had focused on his hunting and fishing more, but that's because that is my personal interest. This is a great story and great insight into a literary giant many seem to forget in today's world of literature.
Lots of details about his life and writing. Personally, I wished it had focused on his hunting and fishing more, but that's because that is my personal interest. This is a great story and great insight into a literary giant many seem to forget in today's world of literature.
December 2, 2025
This meticulously researched and comprehensive biography of Jim Harrison is a worthy tribute to a talented but deeply flawed writer, and a work that will surely remain the definitive account of his life and work.
December 23, 2025
Jim has always been a conflicting figure to me; his myriad strengths and weaknesses are evident in all of his works. Goddard did an excellent job looking at Harrison's life, highlighting the good that is so evidently there, and the ugly as was often needed.
October 13, 2025
Please read my complete review here:
https://open.substack.com/pub/msarki/...
https://open.substack.com/pub/msarki/...
November 8, 2025
Outstanding! Amazing biography! Informative, delightful, funny, touching, truly wonderful. Highly suggest it for those interested in poetry, Jim Harrison, writing, and writers.
November 17, 2025
a life well-lived for the most part. and this biography is excellent at intertwining the life to the writing.
December 20, 2025
A masterpiece of biography. In 420 riveting pages, Todd Goddard somehow manages to convey the WHOLE of his subject. The great writer/poet, yes. But also the relatable human being.
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews