Every school needs a Foxfire project of its own. Here’s a blueprint and instruction manual, as well as ideal bedside reading...
A combined scrapbook, best-of anthology and nostalgic look backward celebrating the homespun birth of the Foxfire empire.
Empire isn’t far from the mark, for in the 1970s, the Foxfire series of books edited by the since-disgraced Appalachian teacher Eliot Wigginton and his students became bibles for back-to-the-landers, especially in the South, and sold by the armload. Wigginton began the project as a practical way to get his students interested in writing, and so he put them to work going beyond the confines of the exclusive school and into the mountains of northeastern Georgia, gathering stories from and about the lives of local people. As the current crop of editors note at several points, that was precisely the time of Deliverance, which was emphatically not good press for the area, though it had its uses—as banjoist Wallace Crowe recalls, “Although it was bad on one hand, it was good for bluegrass music because now if someone hears the banjo, that’s what they are reminded of.” Foxfire and its successor volumes did much to redeem Southern Appalachia from dark images of toothlessness and fallen logs. As with those volumes, this anniversary commemorative offers both theory and practice, the latter ranging from how to live on practically nothing to the fine arts of tying knots, building sleds, caning a chair and raising azaleas from seed. Highlights abound, including an interview with an agriculture inspector who warns of faux-organic stuff on the market, a profile of a local who recalls, “You either moonshined or you sold corn to moonshiners,” and a slew of truly scary ghost stories that would do M.R. James proud.
Every school needs a Foxfire project of its own. Here’s a blueprint and instruction manual, as well as ideal bedside reading for those seeking the simple life.Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-307-74259-9
Page Count: 608
Publisher: Anchor
Review Posted Online: July 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2011
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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