Part one: Desperadoes, Heroes, Movies: Bullets and bodies -- The unenthusiastic chess champion of the world -- Ode to a hoop star -- The movie theater: a dream -- 1964 -- Part two: Writers, Characters, Stratagems: The best southern short story ever? -- Amid the swirling ghosts -- Portrait of the spinster as a young woman -- Best southern short story with a drowned bride, alligators, a fish fry, some light S&M, French Cinema, the Pearl River, Mel Gibson, and a chicken -- How far into grief, disaster, or horror? -- Quartered -- The piano player -- Frank O'Connor -- Isaac Bashevis Singer's perfect short story -- Home for the holidays -- Cawdor -- Dortmunder agonistes -- River stories -- Part three: Notes from a past life: A day on the town -- A concise history of country music -- French baseball -- Fastened -- The parking lot -- A north-south story -- Solesmes -- A year in Quachita Parish.
Summary:
"Caverlee is a writer of cast enthusiasms and range. His general essays, which cover everything from the assassination of Bonnie and Clyde to the mundane evolution of the staple, are as thoughtfully delightful as his literary criticism. It just so happens that I'm a sucker for penetrating and well-written literary criticism. I've learned that there's something oddly enduring about that kind of literary criticism: it can last as long as the literature it examines, and it can even take on the name of literature itself" -- back cover.
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