RiverVue Posts
Back from the Blue Ridge
Just a quick note to say that I have been "on the road" for the past five days, and I have lots of exciting adventures and read more...
Alabama Rules: From Blue-Eyed Soul to Soulful Blues
My friend Deryle Perryman, native of Florence and read more...
The Dog Star Rages and Leos Roar
It is August and the dog days of summer are upon us. The ancient read more...
Where Have All the Small Towns Gone?
The centuries old ubi sunt query—where are those read more...
Alabama in July
The Fourth of July is over and along with it Willie read more...
Alabama: A Place in the Sun
It is July in Alabama and the corn is literally as high as an elephant’s eye. Jungles of lush green flank the country roads. read more...
Southern Literature Series to Premiere on Swampland
“The past isn’t dead. It isn’t even past” (
Father's Day and Rick Bragg
If you are looking for a gift for Father’s Day, look no further than
Tying The Knot: East Meets West in the Deep South
This weekend I attended the wedding of two young friends at the Von Braun read more...
More Six Degrees: From Florence, Alabama, to Florence, Italy
On March 4, 2006, my old friend Deryle Perryman and read more...
Farewell to Art Icon Robert Rauschenberg
Texas born painter, photographer, printmaker, sculptor, choreographer, onstage performer, set designer and, in later years, even a read more...
Too Much Fun
When Deryle Perryman contacted me last week to say read more...
April in Alabama
Nothing could be more beautiful than April in Alabama and, in my case, nothing could be more exciting. I recently returned from the read more...
Alabama: Places to Be and People to See
The Alabama Book Festival held in Montgomery, read more...
Alabama Beat: Words and Music in the Deep South
The three poems currently appearing in the Poetry section of Swampland are by Mississippi born Pulitzer Prize winner
Alabama's Going Green: "Let's Get Dirty"
Huntsville, Alabama, has chosen
Alabama's Going Green: A Delicate Balance
Yes, I read the article in the New York read more...
Alabama's Going Green
Holden Caulfield wanted to know where all the read more...
Black History Month: Look Back, but Move Forward
“Look back but move forward” was the credo of civil rights activist
Water, Water, Everywhere, Nor Any Drop To Drink
Today the New York Times ran an article entitled
Let The Sunshine In
I was listening to NPR on Saturday morning when I heard the bluesy sound of an acoustic guitar and a voice that reminded me of read more...
It's Not Easy Being Indie
I always thought that in my next incarnation I wanted to come back as an independent documentary filmmaker. I held on to that dream read more...
The Day The Music Died
The day was February 3, 1959. At approximately 12:55 AM, Buddy read more...
Lest We Forget: Four Spirits
January 30, 2008, marked the 60th anniversary of the assassination of India’s political and spiritual leader
The Best of All Possible Worlds or Is There Balm in Gilead?
I live in the boonies, the hinterlands of Northern Alabama. For years, I made do with erratic reception from local television read more...
Six Degrees of Separation
In the south we not only claim kin we also claim friends. I have learned that behind every new acquaintance there lies the read more...
White Pelicans on Elk River
White Pelicans are a rarity on Elk River. I have never seen one north of Gulf Shores, but on Christmas morning a friend down the read more...
Music and Movie Making in Alabama
Sorry to have been incommunicado since Thanksgiving. This time I was overwhelmed by the holiday madness and computer read more...
Confessions Redux
This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of Auburn’s 1957 National Championship. Not only did the Tigers go undefeated that read more...
Tiger Rag
In the spring a young man’s fancy may turn to baseball, but in the fall in the South everyone’s fancy turns to read more...
Take Me Out to the Ball Game
Wednesday night’s opening game of the 2007 World Series at
It is Raining on the River!
I guess I rattled my rain stick enough this weekend to wake up the clouds. We In North Alabama are reveling in what the Navajos call read more...
On the Road Again
Sorry I have been incommunicado lately. I am still struggling with allergies that seem to get worse rather than better. Ah, fall in read more...
Arrivederci Roma, Ciao Athens (Alabama)
I have just returned from ten days in Italy (Venice, Florence/Tuscany, and Rome) and am way behind on my blog, so please bear read more...
More Alabama Authors: Eric Smith
Eric Smith is assistant professor of English at the University of Alabama-Huntsville where his speciality is Post Colonial read more...
"When I die, the brush dies": Remembering Jimmie Lee Sudduth
Spotlighting Alabama Authors
During the next few weeks I will be featuring the poetry of several Alabama writers whose poems were published in the recent read more...
Hot and Wet or Hot and Dry?
The state of Alabama made the national news on two consecutive days this week: first regarding the referendum that could read more...
Turtle Tracks
In the fall of 2005, my sister Peggy bought a 1985 Toyota Dolphin RV from her son in Seaside, CA, and in late October Peggy, our read more...
West "by God" Virginia and The Free State of Winston
Is West Virginia really a part of the south? Jason Headley in an article entitled "A State of Confusion" pleads the case read more...
Look Homeward, Angel: In Memoriam Doug Marlette
On Tuesday, July 10, Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Doug read more...
07-07-07
Isn't seven the most powerfully magical number? -- Tom Marvolo Riddle to Horace Slughorn Harry read more...
A Quiet Fourth of July
It is a strangely quiet Fourth of July on the river. Due to the devastating
Dysfunction Junction
There is a interchange in Birmingham, Alabama, that is so infamous it has been dubbed Dysfunction Junction. After the last deadly read more...
Ninety is the New Forty-five
I hope each of you read the newspaper article by James Lewis of Newhouse News Service published on May 26th. Lewis wrote about four read more...
Uneasy Rider
Last weekend I traveled to Austin, Texas, for the 90th birthday celebration of Dr. Elva Mclin, my mentor, friend, and longtime read more...
Celebrations On The River
Today marks the 28th annual Cotton Row Run , a 10K race through read more...
A Long, Hot Summer?
I don’t think it has rained in the Tennessee Valley since the day
RiverVue Reviews
The Prince of Frogtown
“My father was the prince of Frogtown” writes Alabama author and Pulitzer Prize winner Rick Bragg in his latest book read more...
Being Dead Is No Excuse
Being Dead is No Excuse: The Official Southern Ladies Guide to Hosting The Perfect Funeral Hyperion Press, 2005
Darius Goes West
“Something’s gonna happen like…Just spark the whole world,” exclaims Darius, the star of the read more...
KELBRN
Whatever Remembers Us: An Anthology
Whatever Remembers Us: An Anthology of Alabama Poetry edited by Sue Brannan Walker and J. read more...
Dub's Burgers
Dub's Burgers 204 South Jefferson Street Athens, AL 35611 256-232-6135
Whitt's Barbecue
Whitt's #1 1397 East Elm Street Athens, Alabama 35611 256-232-7928 My sister had a read more...
RiverVue ArticlesDr. Milly Caudle: A Renaissance Woman for a Renaissance Town
by Penne J. Laubenthal Milly Caudle, affectionately known as “Red,” is a petite dynamo who was appointed a year and a half ago to fill the unexpired term of Athens City Councilman Henry White who was elected to the state legislature. Milly is currently a candidate for Place Five read more...
Resurrection
by Penne J. Laubenthal Birthdays are often opportunities for self-examination and reflection. Some birthdays provoke more introspection than others. A couple of years ago I decided it was time for me to "live deliberately," in the words of Thoreau: " to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, read more...
Wynton and Willie and the Blues
by Penne J. Laubenthal The Marsalis family and Willie Nelson and I go way back. I have been a fan of Ellis,
Guest blog by Bebe Gish Shaw: Magical Mississippi Tour
There are magical moments in teaching which remind us that we do not teach to live but rather live to teach, and Saturday, April 19, 2008, was one of those halcyon days of academic heaven in which one goes into third person, watching himself watching the wonderment sparkle in students’ eyes. It was a pristine spring day, the azaleas and dogwood in bloom, and read more...
Eddie Hinton Does Porretta--Again!
by Penne J. Laubenthal Eighteen years ago in April of 1991 an Italian named Graziano Uliani, founder of the Porretta Soul Festival, came to
New York City Southern Style: Alabama Studio Weekend in the Shoals
by Penne J. Laubenthal Imagine starting off your Saturday morning with the perfect Bloody Mary, garnished in typical southern fashion with pickled okra, and served to you by one of the country’s foremost clothing designers, Billy Reid, in his boutique housed in the historic and elegantly appointed Pickett Place read more...
Natasha Trethewey: Winner of the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
by Penne J. Laubenthal Pulitzer Prize winner Natasha Trethewey is a poet who gives voice to the voiceless, names to the nameless, and who creates monuments in words for those whom history has forgotten. Relying on photographs, personal memory, read more...
Poems by Natasha Trethewey
Miscegenation In 1965 my parents broke two laws of Mississippi; they went to Ohio to marry, returned to Mississippi. They crossed the river into Cincinnati, a city whose name begins with a sound like sin, the sound of wrong, mis in Mississippi. A year later they moved to Canada, followed a route the read more...
Billy Bob Thornton in Florence, Alabama
by Penne J. Laubenthal Severe weather warnings had been issued for North Alabama when I made my way to Florence for the Friday afternoon session of the 11th Annual George Lindsey Film Festival featuring Billy Bob Thornton. But apparently neither sleet nor snow read more...
Sena Jeter Naslund and Growing Up in the Segregated South
Four Spirits, a novel by Birmingham native Sena Jeter Naslund based on the aftermath of the1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church that killed four little girls, made its world premiere as a theatrical production at the University of Alabama--Huntsville this past weekend. The stage play read more...
Deryle Perryman and Dangerous Highway, a Film About Eddie Hinton
by Penne J. Laubenthal Dangerous Highway is an amazing documentary about the life and music of the incredibly talented and tragically fated Eddie Hinton, called the "greatest unknown musician you have ever heard." The film was made by read more...
Darius Goes West: Twelve Guys and a Dream
Once in a great while, just when you think there is no reason to get up in the morning and that there is no hope for humanity, and that people will just go on killing one another forever, and that tomorrow will be probably be even worse than today, then something happens to turn your world around. For me, that something was seeing a feature length documentary read more...
Logan Smalley: Creator and Director of Darius Goes West
In 2005 Logan Smalley, a special education major at the University of Georgia-Athens, undertook a venture that would change his life, not to mention the lives of those who view his amazing film. Smalley rented a handicapped accessible RV, recruited ten
Fifth Annual Oxford Film Festival
The Fifth Annual Oxford Film Festival (OFF) will open Wednesday evening, February 6, in Oxford, read more...
Billy C Farlow is Having Too Much Fun
by Penne J. Laubenthal Billy C Farlow, blues musician, song writer, and harmonica player who skyrocketed to fame in the early ‘70s with Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen, is a force to be reckoned with on the music circuit. Billy C has been out there for over forty years making his music, writing read more...
Confessions of an Auburn Fan or It's Not Easy Being Orange (and Blue)
by Penne Jones Laubenthal The state of Alabama is a red state. It has been slowly turning red politically since 1960. In the past twenty-seven years, Alabama voters have increasingly voted for Republican candidates at the federal level, especially in Presidential read more...
Interview with Charles Ghigna
by Penne J. Laubenthal Charles Ghigna (aka Father Goose) is the author of more than 5,000 poems and 30 award-winning books of poetry. His books have been featured on ABC-TV’s "Good Morning America" and NPR, selected by the Book-of-the-Month Club and the Parents' Choice Book Award. He is a poet, read more...
Hunting the Cotaco Creek
by Charles Ghigna His hand in hold so trigger tight even its blood believes in ghosts. It clings with set finger on steel and waits inside a dream of ducks. The twilight gives into a rise of eastern sky as sun reveals herself too proud and instantly receives full face a splash of mallard flock. A shotgun blasts the read more...
Baseball Dreams
by Charles Ghigna In memory of Jack Marsh, second baseman, Yale University, 1943 Before the bayonet replaced the bat, Jack Marsh played second base for Yale; his spikes anchored into the August clay, his eyes set deep against the setting sun. The scouts all knew his numbers well, had studied read more...
Shacks on Highway 231, Along the High Red Clay Embankments
By Bonnie Roberts These words are for those who never wrote a word, or sang a song, or thought a great thought, or invented something, or made something lasting. These words are for those who lived extraordinary non-extraordinary lives, of getting up each day, and walking through the day,
Auger and Old Shoes
by Eric Smith I. On her rocker’s each forward pitch she glimpses the scuffed toes of shoes down the hall, unlaced, empty, still at the foot of the bed, a very old cliché, like the read more...
My South
By Doris Gabel Welch My South is Hot Humid Sultry Just like its women. My South is
Phillip Quinn Morris
Phillip Quinn Morris, author of Mussels and
W.C. Handy Music Festival, Florence, Alabama, July 22-29
“If Beale Street could talk Married men would have to take up their beds and walk…” Beale Street Blues W. C. Handy wrote those words when he was living in Memphis in 1916. It had been a long road from Florence, Alabama, to Memphis, Tennessee, read more...
Cassandra King
Alabama native Cassandra King is not only the wife of author Pat Conroy, but she is also a celebrated novelist in her own right. She is currently touring the South to promote her most recent novel
Clifton Taulbert at the 6th Annual Writers Conference
Ah, April in Alabama---blistering sun one day, pouring rain the next. A certainty regarding the South is that one just has to wait long enough and the weather will change. Outside the conference building at Calhoun Community College in Decatur, Alabama, a precious rain is falling, soaking the parched cotton fields and drenching the freshly turned gardens.
Alabama Adventure Weekend
It is Earth Day 2007 and the Alabama sun is unseasonably hot. Summer is still two months away, but the living is already easy, especially in the Shoals area of North Alabama where I am spending the day at the Alabama Adventure Weekend, a two-day banquet of art and culture, fun read more...