Hurricane Katrina has occasioned some excellent, even inspired, commentary journalism. I'm calling your attention to two such pieces, and their authors. One is by John Grisham, a native Mississippian better known for pot-boiling, record-selling fiction than literary nonfiction; the other is by Peter J. Boyer, a once-upon-a-time young sojourner and longtime fan of the Mississippi Gulf Coast, a noted nonfiction author and veteran staff writer for the best magazine written in English, The New Yorker.
In the past week, both of these accomplished wordsmiths wrote impressionistic, first-person narratives after viewing the destruction of much of the Mississippi Gulf Coast: Grisham in today's edition of The New York Times; Boyer in the current issue of The New Yorker. Both pieces are wonderfully written. Both pieces are mostly accurate on the Coast's history, its parallel developing forces of the sacred and the profane--more so in Boyer's longer piece--and the two hurricanes that have defined its modern existence: Camille in 1969, and Katrina, 2005.
But, each piece leaves its readers with vastly different emotions--at least this reader. If you would, please read them both--long though it is, you must read the Boyer narrative to its final punch, and a punch to the gut is exactly what it is--and then please come back to these pages and leave a comment.
I mean it, I really want to know what you think and feel? I know more than a few other folks who need to know how you think and feel about what's at issue. I've never really asked such a thing before. I am now. Take a moment; leave a thought. Please. Thank you.
For titillation purposes, I am going to quote, anonymously, a line recently written to me by one of the best writers I know as a comment on Boyer's piece:
"The New Yorker article is very well done, and extremely honest in that it manages to depict Billy Guice as the crass heartless bastard he is."
