Doris Grumbach’s Lifelong Search for Meaning

At the age of 27, Doris Grumbach unexpectedly encountered a “feeling of peace so intense that it seemed to expand into ineffable joy.” The Presence of Absence is her story of the 50-year journey to recapture that experience. Those who are familiar with the search for transcendent clarity—that elusive, higher spiritual power—will be able to closely relate to Doris as she seeks an all-consuming peace.

In her search, Doris encounters pain and disease, as well as people and beliefs from all walks of life. This not only makes her question her own beliefs, but also helps her redefine what she is in search of. While Doris claims she has never been deeply religious, she uses the word “God” to describe what she is looking for, but realizes that the word means something different to everyone. The word “God” doesn’t have to hold the traditional meaning of a heavenly being—it can mean “calm,” or “spiritual presence,” or, simply, “peace.” For Doris, it is all of these things.

You’ve heard it before, but oftentimes the journey is more important than the destination, and nowhere is that truer than in Doris Grumbach’s The Presence of Absence. Through her nearly lifelong journey, she relentlessly seeks God, in any form, but perhaps finds something more astonishing: She had been interacting with God the entire time.

Doris Grumbach has been a literary editor of the New Republic, a nonfiction columnist for the New York Times Book Review, and a book reviewer for National Public Radio. Throughout her prolific career, she has been hailed as a feminist novelist, essayist, critic, and memoirist on issues facing women, homosexuality, and the elderly.