Talking Up a Storm
Voices of the New West
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- $18.99
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
In interviews with fifteen contemporary writers of the American West, Gregory L. Morris demonstrates what these widely divergent talents have in common: they all redefine what it is to be a western writer. No longer enthralled (though sometimes inspired) by the literary traditions of openness, place, and rugged individualism, each of the writers has remained true to the demand for clarity, strength, and honesty, virtues sustained in their conversations.
Morris talks with Ralph Beer, Mary Clearman Blew, Elizabeth Cook-Lynn, James Crumley, Ivan Doig, Gretel Ehrlich, Richard Ford, Molly Gloss, Ron Hansen, John Keeble, William Kittredge, David Long, Thomas McGuane, Amy Tan, and Douglas Unger. Their lives and fiction stretch from Montana to Texas, from ranches to universities, from sea level to mountain slopes.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Between 1988 and 1992 Morris, associate professor of American literature at Pennsylvania State University, conducted interviews in person or by mail with 15 contemporary western writers of fiction. The majority of authors in these lively and engaging conversations pay tribute to older writers like A.B. Guthrie but concern themselves with the West as an area in transition rather than a land with a mythological past. The stories of Elizabeth Cook-Lynn (Then Badger Said This), a Native American from South Dakota, give a voice to the experience of her people; John Keeble (Broken Ground), who lives in Washington State, addresses the impact of corporate greed on the land. Many of the authors Morris interviewed are from Montana (Richard Ford, Mary Clearman Blew, William Kittredge, David Long) and represent a community of writers shaping a new vision of the West. Of interest to readers of serious fiction. Photos not seen by PW.
