Larry Brown continued
PGPear...@aol.com
almost finished final novel, A MIRACLE OF CATFISH to complete. (There
are also two books of essays---ON FIRE and BILLY RAY'S FARM to get
to).
As Barry Hannah quotes Charles Bukowski in his Larry Brown: Passion To
Brilliance tribute (found at the front of A MIRACLE OF CATFISH), "When
death comes for him it should be ashamed".
Amen.
A movie based on Brown's BIG BAD LOVE (w/Debra Winger and Arliss
Howard) includes one of the most emotional and heart wrenching scenes
ever put on film.
Paul Pearson (see below)
===========================================================================
Larry Brown (author)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Larry Brown
Born July 9, 1951
Oxford, Mississippi
Died November 24, 2004
Oxford, Mississippi
Occupation Writer
Genres Fiction and nonfiction
Larry Brown (July 9, 1951–November 24, 2004) was an American writer
who was born and lived in Oxford, Mississippi. Brown wrote fiction and
nonfiction. He graduated from high school in Oxford but did not go to
college. Many years later, he took a creative writing class from the
Mississippi novelist Ellen Douglas. Brown served in the United States
Marine Corps from 1970 to 1972. On his return to Oxford, he worked at
a small stove company before joining the city fire department.
An avid reader, Brown began writing in his spare time while he worked
as a firefighter (at City Station No.1 on North Lamar Blvd.) in Oxford
in 1980. The nonfiction book On Fire describes how Brown, having
trouble with sleeping at the fire station, would stay up to read and
write while the other firefighters slept. His duties as a firefighter
included answering fire alarms at Rowan Oak--the home of William
Faulkner, now a museum--and the University of Mississippi campus. By
his own account, Brown wrote five unpublished novels, including one
that he always used as an example to younger writers about a man-
eating bear loose in Yellowstone Park, and hundreds of short stories
before he began to publish. His first published work was a short story
that appeared in the June 1982 issue of biker magazine Easyriders. His
first books were two collections of short stories: Facing the Music
(1988) and Big Bad Love (1990). After 1990, Brown turned to writing
full time and increasingly turned to the novel as his primary form.
Brown's novels include Dirty Work (1989), Father and Son (1996), Joe
(1991), Fay (2000), and The Rabbit Factory (2003).
In March 2007, Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill published Brown's
unfinished novel A Miracle of Catfish. Although Brown died before
finishing the book, the final page of the published version includes
his notes about how he wanted the novel to end. The novel also
includes a lengthy introduction by Brown's editor, Shannon Ravenel,
discussing her work on the project and her work with Brown over the
years. Except for the novel The Rabbit Factory, all of Brown's books
were published by Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, a division of
Workman Publishing. The paperback editions of Brown's early works were
published by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, although other
paperback houses picked up his later works.
Brown's nonfiction includes On Fire (1995), on the subject of his 17
years (1973-1990) as a firefighter, and Billy Ray's Farm (2001).
Brown was awarded the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters award
for fiction. Brown was the first two-time winner of the Southern Book
Award for Fiction, which he won in 1992 for his novel, Joe and again
in 1997 for his novel Father and Son. In 1998, he received a Lila
Wallace-Readers Digest Award, which granted him $35,000 per year for
three years to write. In 2000, the State of Mississippi granted him a
Governor's Award For Excellence in the Arts.
For one semester, Brown taught as a writer-in-residence in the
creative writing program at the University of Mississippi, temporarily
taking over the position held by his friend Barry Hannah. He later
served as visiting writer at the University of Montana in Missoula. He
taught briefly at other colleges throughout the United States. He has
been compared to other Southern writers, including Cormac McCarthy,
William Faulkner and Harry Crews. In interviews, Brown cited these
authors, along with Flannery O'Connor, Raymond Carver and Charles
Bukowski, as influences. He also cited contemporary music as an
influence, and his tastes were broad. He appeared with the Texas alt-
rock band fronted by Alejandro Escovedo, a good friend of his, and he
cited the lyrics of Leonard Cohen as an influence. He also had friends
in the film industry, including Billy Bob Thornton.
A film based on Big Bad Love starring Debra Winger and Arliss Howard
was released in 2001. The majority of the film was shot in neighboring
Marshall County and Holly Springs, to the north of Oxford. Independent
filmmaker Gary Hawkins directed a documentary of Brown's life and
works in The Rough South of Larry Brown (2002).
Brown died of an apparent heart attack at his home in the Yocona
community, near Oxford, in November 2004.
[edit] Works
Facing the Music (1988) - short stories
'Dirty Work (1989) - novel
Big Bad Love (1990) - short stories
Joe (1991) - novel
On Fire (1993) - autobiography
Father and Son (1996) - novel
Fay (2000) - novel
Billy Ray's Farm: Essays from a Place Called Tula (2001) - Essays
The Rabbit Factory (2003) - novel
(posthumously) A Miracle of Catfish (2007) - novel
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Brown_(author)
Just Walkin'
wrote:
I am almost there; read everything before but got bogged down in Fay.
Anyone else have that problem?
PGPear...@aol.com
>
> - Show quoted text -
I liked FAY. Quite a story!
Paul Pearson
Upbeat & Cheerful Martin
> Anyone else have that problem?
You mean you liked Fay or had trouble with it? I think it's his best
novel, coming just in front of Dirty Work (best short stories: Big Bad
Love). Do you have any signed copies? I got a bit carried away - 5
of my titles are signed..!
PGPear...@aol.com
I think Fay was one of Brown's best works.
Interesting (but fatally flawed) character who first shows up in JOE.
Paul Pearson
Just Walkin'
I like Fay, for the most part, and I like Larry Brown. I was blown
away by all his other work. Fay, though, to me seems a little too
refined and maybe a little too slow moving, at least compared to his
other work. I got about a third of the way through and got distracted
by something else. Maybe it's just me...I'll finish it and report
back.
So far, I've only got Dirty Work and Big Bad Love in signed editions.
Why do you ask? Do you collect signed work?
Upbeat & Cheerful Martin
> So far, I've only got Dirty Work and Big Bad Love in signed editions.
> Why do you ask? Do you collect signed work?
Just curious...Larry Brown sent me a signed copy of Joe about 10 years
ago, and after he died I collected some more. I also have a signed
Bukowski. It's funny, Fay is probably the first or second novel of
his I'd recommend, I couldn't put it down
TIM...@aol.com
With Larry Brown, my discussion with myself has been, which novel is
better, Joe or Faye. I should say Faye because the main character is so
fascinating, but in the end, I have to go with Joe. It's more original,
particularly the scenes with Faye's father. And I like Joe's striving for redemention.
Faye is great too, but he seems to trying a thriller aspect that doesn't
quite get pulled off, the guy who was completely burned. Without a doubt
though, two great novels.
I couldn't finish the Catfish book. If you have a better opinion of it than
I, I might be encouraged to give it another shot
In a message dated 11/24/2009 12:04:07 AM Eastern Standard Time,
LIST...@listserv.brown.edu writes:
Larry Brown continued
On Nov 23, 4:08=A0pm, "Just Walkin'" <kensh...@comcast.net> wrote:
> On Nov 23, 10:46=A0am, "PGPearson1...@aol.com" <PGPearson1...@aol.com>
> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > I just read THE RABBIT FACTORY which leaves for me only Larry Brown's
> > almost finished final novel, A MIRACLE OF CATFISH to complete.
=A0(Ther=
e
> > are also two books of essays---ON FIRE and BILLY RAY'S FARM to get
> > to).
>
> > As Barry Hannah quotes Charles Bukowski in his Larry Brown: Passion To
> > Brilliance tribute (found at the front of A MIRACLE OF CATFISH), "When
> > death comes for him it should be ashamed".
>
> > Amen.
>
> > A movie based on Brown's BIG BAD LOVE (w/Debra Winger and Arliss
> > Howard) includes one of the most emotional and heart wrenching scenes
> > ever put on film.
>
> > Paul Pearson =A0(see below)
> > =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=
=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=
=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=
=3D=3D
>
> > Larry Brown (author)
> > From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
>
> > Larry Brown
> > Born July 9, 1951
> > Oxford, Mississippi
> > Died November 24, 2004
> > Oxford, Mississippi
> > Occupation Writer
> > Genres Fiction and nonfiction
>
> > Larry Brown (July 9, 1951=96November 24, 2004) was an American writer
novelhttp://en.wikipedia.o=
Just Walkin'
> I liked FAY. Quite a story!
>
> Paul Pearson
>
the rough edges on his first 5 fit the subject. Fay is a bit more, er,
polished. Maybe that's it. As I said, I'll report back, AIIM...
Upbeat & Cheerful Martin
> Don't get me wrong. He's enthralled me for six books already. Perhaps
> the rough edges on his first 5 fit the subject. Fay is a bit more, er,
> polished. Maybe that's it. As I said, I'll report back, AIIM...
It's definitely more polished. It reads like a film (translation:
movie) in your head. That's why I couldn't put it down, it was like
watching a really good film
Just Walkin'
But nothing left for closure; everything is revealed.
In his earlier books, the hard edges and shifts in person and tense
leave a lot to the imagination and the reader's own ability to cobble
together the visuals from the clues he scatters (and selectively
reveals) along the way. They were thoroughly engaging; Fay is an easy
read by comparison.
Upbeat & Cheerful Martin
> Fay is an easy
> read by comparison
That's okay though - think of it as the Nashville Skyline to Dirty
Work's Highway 61. Both are worthwhile and really fucking good ways
to spend your time. RMD on the other hand...
PGPear...@aol.com
Kind of a bizarre shot gun ending (I won't mention the city that Fay
ends up in) given the fact that it's mentioned in the inner jacket
description. It's like saying "the butler did it" on the cover.
Paul Pearson
Just Walkin'
You are right, Martin. Fay is a fabulous book. After I got past the
polish, and the Chabon-esque descriptions of ordinary things, the
whole book came down on me like a landslide.
And, in my view, it's more of a Blonde On Blonde jug of white
lightnin' than a Nashville Skyline shot of Jack and beer.
IM frank and HO, that is.