Book Review (Reprinted from BookLoons)
Posted on May 18th, 2010
As a fiercely haunting and paradoxically beautiful tale of love, neglect, betrayal, and justice within and among families, Mudbound introduces readers to some of the most remarkable characters to have appeared recently in American literature: In one family you have Henry McAllan (the successful engineer and wounded veteran of the Great War whose ties to southern traditions and his Mississippi farm dominate his and his family’s life); his much younger brother Jamie (an emotionally scarred veteran of World War II whose devotion to his family and friends will be sorely tested); Pappy McAllan (the ‘sour, bossy, and vain‘ family patriarch whose attitudes towards others in his family and his virulent bigotry threaten to destroy the entire family); and Laura Chappell (the Memphis-born English teacher, lover of Dickens and the Brontë sisters, and wife of Henry McAllan whose life becomes overturned by her husband’s decisions, her brother-in-law’s passion, her father-in-law’s spiteful disposition, and her adjustment to a very different way of life). In another family you have Florence and Hap Jackson (African-American tenant farmers whose reluctant relationship with and dependence upon the McAllan family will lead to strained friendships and unspeakable tragedy); and Ronsel Jackson (the World War II tank battalion veteran whose return to his family and whose friendship with Jamie McAllan will lead to consequences no one could have possibly imagined). With the Mississippi Delta dirt of the McAllan farm as the novel’s dominant symbol – an iconic allusion to the Hebrew adamah of the Old Testament Genesis – and with the author employing each of the main characters as the novel’s alternating narrators,Mudbound, one of the best novels about the American south and American families to have appeared in the last quarter century, is an extraordinarily effective examination of the terrifying collision of values and attitudes in Mississippi in the late 1940s. So, readers of quality literature, here is the bottom line: Mudbound is intense, beautiful, and unforgettable. Don’t miss it!
Mudbound
by Hillary Jordan
A wonderful voice in southern American literature – reminiscent of the best of William Faulkner and Eudora Welty – has emerged in Hillary Jordan’s uncommonly powerful debut novel, Mudbound.
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Reading “A Late Encounter with the Enemy”
Posted on May 10th, 2010
As the eighth story in Flannery O’Connor’s first published collection, A Good Man is Hard to Find, “A Late Encounter with the Enemy” invites readers to contemplate what many have perceived as the American south’s preoccupation with the region’s defeat during the American Civil War.
First, before a more direct encounter with O’Connor’s short story, however, readers might want to consider an important moment in another story by another writer from the American south: William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily.” Near the end of Faulkner’s superb gothic tale, a story that is frequently and justifiably anthologized in college-level literature survey course textbooks, the narrator makes this perceptive observation about the old men who come to a funeral: “[A]nd the very old men—some in their brushed Confederate uniforms—on the porch and the lawn, talking of Miss Emily as if she had been a contemporary of theirs, believing they that they had danced with her and courted her perhaps, confusing time with its mathematical progression, as the old do, to whom all the past is not a diminishing road but, instead, a huge meadow which no winter ever touches, divided from them now by the narrow bottleneck of the most recent decade of years.” Remember the metaphor—meadow for memory—when reading “A Late Encounter with the Enemy.”
Second, further postponing our encounter with O’Connor’s story, consider first southern writer Walker Percy’s explanation for why the American south produced so many good writers: “Because we lost the War.” O’Connor, responding to Percy (in her essay entitled “The Regional Writer”), expands upon Percy’s theory by suggesting that the American Civil War had a profound effect upon the collective psyche of southerners: “What he was saying was that we have had our Fall[.
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Review -Written Lives
Posted on February 5th, 2010
Written Lives by Javier Marías (translated by Margaret Jull Costa)
New Directions
ISBN 978-0-8112-1689-0
Trade Paperback
Okay, booklovers and prolific readers, here is a great little book to carry along down to the beach on the Gulf shores, to your vacation getaway in the mountains, or to your lawn-chair in your backyard for a relaxing afternoon.
Internationally renowned Spanish author Javier Marías has served up a wonderful picnic buffet of biographical tidbits in which readers will discover strange and surprising things about some of the world’s most famous writers.
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Southern Voice: Twilight by William Gay
Posted on August 20th, 2009
From the Southern Voices Series
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Southern Voice: Mudbound
Posted on August 14th, 2009
From the Southern Voices series
Mudbound by Hillary Jordan
Algonquin, 2008
A wonderful new voice in southern American literature – reminiscent of the best of William Faulkner and Eudora Welty – has emerged in Hillary Jordan’s uncommonly powerful debut novel, Mudbound.
As a fiercely haunting and paradoxically beautiful tale of love, neglect, betrayal, and justice within and among families, Mudbound introduces readers to some of the most remarkable characters to have appeared recently in American literature:
In one family you have Henry McAllan (the successful engineer and wounded veteran of the Great War whose ties to southern traditions and his Mississippi farm dominate his and his family’s life); his much younger brother Jamie (an emotionally scarred veteran of World War II whose devotion to his family and friends will be sorely tested); Pappy McAllan (the ‘sour, bossy, and vain‘ family patriarch whose attitudes towards others in his family and his virulent bigotry threaten to destroy the entire family); and Laura Chappell (the Memphis-born English teacher, lover of Dickens and the Brontë sisters, and wife of Henry McAllan whose life becomes overturned by her husband’s decisions, her brother-in-law’s passion, her father-in-law’s spiteful disposition, and her adjustment to a very different way of life).
In another family you have Florence and Hap Jackson (African-American tenant farmers whose reluctant relationship with and dependence upon the McAllan family will lead to strained friendships and unspeakable tragedy); and Ronsel Jackson (the World War II tank battalion veteran whose return to his family and whose friendship with Jamie McAllan will lead to consequences no one could have possibly imagined).
With the Mississippi Delta dirt of the McAllan farm as the novel’s dominant symbol – an iconic allusion to the Hebrew adamah of the Old Testament Genesis – and with the author employing each of the main characters as the novel’s alternating narrators,Mudbound, one of the best novels about the American south and American families to have appeared in the last quarter century, is an extraordinarily effective examination of the terrifying collision of values and attitudes in Mississippi in the late 1940s.
So, readers of quality literature, here is the bottom line: Mudbound is intense, beautiful, and unforgettable.
Filed under News and Reviews | Comments Off