A Publication of Humanities Tennessee

Misfits and Magic

September 27, 2012 When Wendy Welch and her Scottish husband, Jack Beck, decided to open a used bookstore in the small town of Big Stone Gap, Virginia, they had a whimsical vision of what their lives would be like. Soon enough, they were introduced to the long hours, aching backs, small margins, and myriad problems that make up the life of an independent bookseller. In The Little Bookstore of Big Stone Gap, Welch describes the evolution of their business, as they are led full-circle to the realization that, despite all the headaches, “Bookshops are magic, and books are the road maps by which misfits find each other.” Wendy Welch will discuss The Little Bookstore of Big Stone Gap at Union Ave. Books in Knoxville on October 6 at 2 p.m., Parnassus Books in Nashville on November 8 at 6:30 p.m., and at The Booksellers at Laurelwood in Memphis on November 9 at 6 p.m.

As American As Apple Pie

Tony Horwitz’s Midnight Rising: John Brown and the Raid that Sparked the Civil War tells the gripping story of John Brown, the abolitionist who in 1859 organized and led a raid on the federal armory at Harpers Ferry in an attempt to further the cause of emancipation of the American slave population. Today Horwitz talks with Knoxville novelist Christopher Hebert, author of The Boiling Season, about a man as fascinating as his deeds. Tony Horwitz and Christopher Hebert will appear at the twenty-fourth annual Southern Festival of Books, held October 12-14 at Legislative Plaza in Nashville. Hebert will discuss his novel, The Boiling Season, on October 12 at 1 p.m. in Conference Room 1A of the Nashville Public Library. Horwitz will discuss Midnight Rising on October 14 at noon in the Nashville Public Library Auditorium. All festival events are free and open to the public.

As American As Apple Pie

Miscarriage of Justice

September 18, 2012 In 1993, the bodies of three eight-year-old boys were found mutilated in the woods outside West Memphis, Arkansas, and Damien Echols was convicted, with two other teenage boys, of their murder. Eighteen years later, DNA evidence and the activism of many people who believed in his innocence finally set Echols free from Death Row. He will discuss Life After Death, a memoir about his ordeal, at Nashville’s Southern Festival of Books on October 14 at 1 p.m. in the War Memorial Auditorium. All festival events are free and open to the public.

The City of Lights—and Annoyances

September 14, 2012 Rosecrans Baldwin was a budding writer in New York when, in 2007, he moved with his wife to Paris for a job in advertising. Like many Americans, Baldwin had a romantic vision of what his Paris life would be like; what it was actually like, from the bad coffee to the bad fashion to the bad manners—not to mention countless absurdly beautiful, and beautifully absurd, moments in between—forms the basis of his second book, Paris, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down. He will at the twenty-fourth annual Southern Festival of Books, held October 12-14 at Legislative Plaza in Nashville. All events are free and open to the public.

The City of Lights—and Annoyances

“I Shall Never Have a Friend Like Her”

September 12, 2012 In 1873, when Edith Wharton was eleven years old, her parents hired a young governess named Anna Bahlmann. The two developed a close relationship that lasted until Bahlmann’s death forty-two years later. In My Dear Governess: The Letters of Edith Wharton to Anna Bahlmann, Irene Goldman-Price traces the disparate but intertwined lives of the two women through their correspondence, offering a new picture of Wharton’s early years. Goldman-Price will join novelist Jennie Fields, author of The Age of Desire, for “A Talk on Edith Wharton” on September 20 at 6:15 p.m. at the Nashville Public Library, as part of the Salon@615 series. The event is free and open to the public.

Hopeless Dreamers

September 7, 2012 There’s something heady about watching a pro wrangle with the definition of American identity. Almost as much as we love to reinvent ourselves, we love to reinvent the definition of ourselves, to give that narrative a fresh coat of paint. In Bunch of Amateurs: A Search for the American Character, Jack Hitt puts himself to this uber-American task, making a lively and ultimately convincing argument about amateurism as a mainstay of American identity. Hitt will discuss Bunch of Amateurs at the twenty-fourth annual Southern Festival of Books, held October 12-14 at Legislative Plaza in Nashville. All events are free and open to the public.

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