Anna Olswanger’s A Visit to Moscow depicts a modern exodus
FROM THE CHAPTER 16 ARCHIVE: In 1965, an American rabbi investigating persecution of Jews in the former Soviet Union escaped KGB handlers to make a remarkable discovery, as told in A Visit to Moscow, a graphic history by Memphis native Anna Olswanger.
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50 Books / HT50, Part 4: 1994-1998
Tennessee was connected to some exceptional literary achievements during the second half of the 1990s, including a Pulitzer Prize for poetry awarded to a native son and a legendary journalist’s acclaimed book about the extraordinary young civil rights activists who worked to end segregation in Nashville.
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Theresa Levitt’s Elixir chronicles an early collaboration between perfumers and chemists
In Elixir, historian Theresa Levitt shows how perfumers and chemists in revolutionary and post-revolutionary France set out to unveil the mystery of life. Levitt will discuss the book at Novel in Memphis on December 5.
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Angela Sutton recounts a pivotal battle in the history of the Atlantic slave trade
Angela Sutton’s Pirates of the Slave Trade weaves together biographies of fascinating figures, tales of maritime warfare, and analyses of politics and power in Europe and West Africa — with implications for the system of slavery that shaped the United States.
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Poet Danielle Chapman grapples with her Southern roots
In Holler: A Poet Among Patriots, Danielle Chapman grapples with the meaning of her Middle Tennessee ancestry and military forbears, including a Confederate second-great grandfather. Chapman will appear at Calvary Episcopal Church in Memphis on March 17, Rhodes College on March 18, and Middle Tennessee State University on March 19.
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Sometimes an actual goodbye is beside the point
Who am I to deny this nod from the Universe, this spark of divinity made flesh? I took the small miracle and held it in my hands like a caramel sweet enough to hurt my teeth.
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