Marce Catlett: The Force of a Story
A Port William Novel
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
In the newest novel in the Port William series, Wendell Berry’s beloved protagonist Andy Catlett tells the inspiring story of his grandfather Marce Catlett to his own children and grandchildren, and gives them a key to their place on the questionably settled land they all love
Andy Catlett’s story begins as his grandfather Marce Catlett rises in the dark to travel from his farm by horseback and train to Louisville for the auction of his 1906 tobacco crop. The price paid for each year’s crop has been depressed to virtually nothing by the power of a single buyer, James B. Duke. This year is especially grim since the price offered to each grower is less than the expense of bringing the crop to market. A year’s labor is lost.
Marce returns to his family defeated, defiant, and determined to grow another crop. Many of his fellow farmers at first seem to lack the resiliency and resourcefulness to continue. Only with the cooperation of other growers can a way be found that protects these farmers and keeps their rural families vital and in place.
The power and depth of this story—and of the many stories within the history of the Port William Membership—resonate with love, kindness, and the held memory of family and community. In Marce Catlett: The Force of a Story, celebrated author Wendell Berry brings to life a tale that devoted readers of the series will cherish. This moving novel is a testament to the goodwill that lives within the human heart and a stirring reminder that standing up for what we believe in is always a cause worth fighting for.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Berry explores the heritage of Andy Catlett, protagonist of his Port William stories and novels (including Jayber Crow), in this wistful tale of the steady decline of tobacco farming in America. In 1906, when Andy's paternal grandfather, Marce, travels to Louisville to sell his crop, he winds up taking a loss. Marce's son, Wheeler, who goes on to become a lawyer, remembers how his father's despondency moved him to help create the Burley Tobacco Growers Co-operative Association, which sought to guarantee fair prices for farmers. From there, the narrative snakes between Wheeler being pulled back to Port William after a stint working for a congressman in Washington, D.C., and his son Andy's reminiscences of his youth laboring as a hired hand on local tobacco farms. Andy looks back with fondness on the days before automation, when people like Marce tended crops by hand: "He had loved profoundly his grandpa's way of farming, when people and animals had collaborated in ways long known and now gone." In granular, Melville-esque depictions of the process by which tobacco was once cultivated, Berry crafts a paean to a distant way of life. The author's fans will love this.
