A Publication of Humanities Tennessee

Waking to Racism in 1958

By Ralph Bowden

March 19, 2013 In 1958, institutional racism infected all life in the deep South. Because of distant threats—court decisions, freedom riders, and the like—its influence was perhaps more entrenched than ever. Yet many whites seemed oblivious to its pernicious effects. In James Williamson’s novel, The Ravine, a thirteen-year-old boy from a privileged white family in Memphis spends the summer in a small Mississippi community, where a violent tragedy changes his life profoundly.

Before FEMA

By Ralph Bowden

March 5, 2013 Drawing on an impressive collection of sources, Memphis librarian Patrick O’Daniel has documented every aspect of the disastrous Mississippi Valley flood of 1927. His new book, When the Levee Breaks, is a condensed encyclopedia covering where the water came from, where the levees broke, who died, who was rescued, and who responded. Memphis, which mostly escaped the devastation, became the main response center for recovery, and O’Daniel uses the flood as a vehicle for examining the Mississippi Valley’s agricultural and economic condition in 1927, the pervasive racism of the time, and the politics involved in rebuilding. Patrick O’Daniel will discuss the book at The Booksellers at Laurelwood in Memphis on March 9 at 2 p.m.

Social History, Illuminated

By Ralph Bowden

February 14, 2013 The American fascination with technology began in the late nineteenth century with the development of electric light. Many researchers and experimenters were involved in the discovery, though credit usually goes to Thomas Edison because he successfully commercialized his model of the incandescent bulb. As University of Tennessee historian Ernest Freeberg notes in a new book, the effect of adequate illumination—on work, entertainment, family life, safety, medicine, social class, architecture, business, and industry—was enormous. The Age of Edison is a social history of America from about 1880 to 1935, as illuminated by electric light. Freeberg will appear at Union Ave. Books in Knoxville on February 21 at 6 p.m.

British Invasions, Successful and Not

By Ralph Bowden

February 5, 2013 Thanks to slow and unreliable communications between the admiralty and ships at sea, naval officers such as fictional hero Captain Alan Lewrie could often exercise considerable independence once out of port. In Hostile Shores, Dewey Lambin’s nineteenth Alan Lewrie adventure, however, Lewrie’s frigate, Reliant, is under the close command of a half-baked commodore with dreams of grandeur. Lewrie nevertheless finds ways to maneuver, sometimes stepping on toes or taking considerable risks. His adventures here, as always, are rollicking good yarns, with authentic details and characters, a hero, his ship, and lots of excitement.

Under the Guns

By Ralph Bowden

December 14, 2012 In 1946, soon after returning from World War II, Marine lieutenant Christopher S. Donner wrote a memoir that chronicled his experiences as an artillery officer in the Pacific. Lt. Donner served as a Forward Observer in Okinawa, literally under the guns, spotting where the shells hit and calling in adjustments to the battery behind. More than sixty years later, Jack H. McCall, an attorney in Knoxville and a former Army officer, has edited and annotated Donner’s manuscript. Pacific Time on Target is a thoughtful portrait of the Pacific war from the point of view of a junior officer in the thick of things.

Under the Guns

Justice in Post-Peace Ireland

By Ralph Bowden

December 4, 2012 Originally from Belfast, Knoxville author James B. Johnston left Ireland in 1974, during “the Troubles,” but no Irish native can ever escape the effects of that period. Everyone in Ireland knows somebody—probably many people—who were killed or injured during that time. The Belfast Peace Agreement of 1998 stopped most of the violence, finally, but didn’t entirely settle issues of justice, retribution, and punishment. Johnston’s new novel, The Price of Peace, sets up a fictional case involving a bombing and retribution designed to explore those issues. Is real justice possible after the Peace accord?

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