The Pittsburgh Anthology

“Characterizing a place can be an elusive project, but The Pittsburgh Anthology is . . . diverse, surprising, eloquent, playful, scrappy, and tenacious.” —Ploughshares
 
Pittsburgh is ever-changing—once dusted with soot from the mills, parts of the city now gleam with the polish of new technologies and little remains of what had been there before. The essays and artwork in this anthology aim for the surprising, elusive stories that capture a Pittsburgh that is in transition. Contributors run the gamut from MacArthur-award winning photographer, LaToya Ruby Frazier to 15-year-old Nico Chiodi, the book’s youngest contributor who chronicles the doings of the North Side Banjo Club. “Everyone in this book,” writes editor, Eric Boyd, “is talking about the city, the things surrounding it; all of the pieces have been created with experience, intimacy, and personality. This book, I hope, will speak to you, not at you. Because we all know this city is changing. We’re just not exactly sure what that means.”
 
Included are contributions by Amy Jo Burns, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Ben Gwin, Cody McDevitt, David Newman, and many more.
 
“These voices are varied and quirky, some polished and professional sounding, some a little rough around the edges. But they are uniformly interesting and genuine.” —Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
 
“What editor Eric Boyd has chosen to do is temper all of the Most Livable City rah rah with essays, stories and poems of a grittier, more complex nature.” —Pittsburgh Magazine
 
“This collection is stimulating for insiders and outsiders alike, a portrait Boyd has designed to be from-the-streets, warts-and-all.” —Bill O’Driscoll, PGH City Paper