Browse A-Z Authors: Jn-Jz

Known for his lyrical prose and clear insight, Fenton Johnson explores what it means to be not single-meaningless outside of coupledom-but solitary, able to be alone, inclined to mine the treasures of inner life. Johnson taps into an older tradition embodied by Trappist monks near the Kentucky home where he grew up, and by artists and writers including Paul Cézanne, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Henry David Thoreau, Henry James, Eudora Welty, Zora Neale Hurston, Rod McKuen, Nina Simone, and Bill Cunningham. Johnson includes his parents, who in workshop or garden found places to be alone; married people, too, can be solitaries in spirit. A hybrid of memoir, inspiration, social criticism, and celebration of the lives of great solitary artists, At the Center of All Beauty will resonate with anyone needing a break from the clamor of society.

Make no mistake: Martha Bragg Picket is a headstrong southern woman with a rebellious spirit, a characteristic her son Michael shares. Yet to see her after almost twenty years of marriage, it might no longer seem clear. A Yankee contractor's arrival in town catalyzes her dissatisfaction, leading her to turn her life upside down -- unaware that her son will follow suit. Both heartfelt and shrewdly humorous, this widely acclaimed first novel from author Fenton Johnson is an affecting look at one woman's reawakening and her son's coming of age in the heartland of America. First published in 1989.

Part retrospective, part memoir, Fenton Johnson's collection Everywhere Home: A Life in Essays explores sexuality, religion, geography, the AIDS crisis, and more. Johnson's wanderings take him from the hills of Kentucky to those of San Francisco, from the streets of Paris to the sidewalks of Calcutta. Along the way, he investigates questions large and small: What's the relationship between artists and museums, illuminated in a New Guinean display of shrunken heads? What's the difference between empiricism and intuition? The collection draws together essays that originally appeared in Harper's, The New York Times, All Things Considered and elsewhere, along with new work. Johnson reports from the front lines of the AIDS epidemic, from Burning Man, from monasteries near and far. His subject matter ranges from Oscar Wilde to censorship in journalism to Kentucky basketball. Everywhere Home is the latest title in Sarabande's Bruckheimer Series in Kentucky Literature.

From the author of the award-winning novels Crossing The River and Scissors, Paper, Rock comes a powerful book about the transformative power of love. Fenton Johnson recounts the history of "how I feel in love how I came to be with someone else, how he came to death and how I helped." Johnson interweaves two stories: his own upbringing as the youngest of a Kentucky whiskey maker's nine children, and that of his lover LarD Rose, the only child of German Jews. survivors of the Holocaust. Interweaving the story of his own upbringing with that of his lover, the author tells the history of how they came to fall in love and how he coped after his partner's death from AIDS. First published in 1996.

In his resonant account of a spiritual quest, Fenton Johnson examines what it means for a skeptic to have and to keep faith. Exploring Western and Eastern monastic traditions, Johnson lives as a member of the community at the Trappist Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky and at the branches of the San Francisco Zen Center. Ultimately his encounter with Buddhism brings him to a new understanding and embrace of Christianity. Weaving together meditations on Johnson's spiritual journey with history and insights from modern monks, Keeping Faith offers a blueprint for a new way of practicing faith.

Having taken great risks -- to immigrate to America, to take monastic vows -- Bengali physician Meena Chatterjee and Brother Flavian are each seeking safety and security when they encounter Johnny Faye, a Vietnam vet, free spirit, and expert marijuana farmer. Amid the fields and forests of a Trappist monastery, Johnny Faye patiently cultivates Meena's and Flavian's capacity for faith, transforming all they thought they knew about duty and desire. In turn they offer him an experience of civilization other than war and chaos. But Johnny Faye's law-breaking sets him against a district attorney for whom the law is a tool for ambition rather than justice. Their confrontation leads to a harrowing reckoning that ensnares Dr. Chatterjee and Brother Flavian, who must make a life-or-death choice between an act of justice that may precipitate their ruin or a betrayal that offers salvation. Inspired by the real-life state police kidnapping and murder of a legendary storyteller and petty criminal, The Man Who Loved Birds engages pressing contemporary issues through a timeless narrative of ill-fated romance. Celebrated author Fenton Johnson has woven a seamless, haunting fable exploring the eternal conflicts between free will and destiny, politics and nature, the power of law and the power of love.

Along with his siblings, Raphael Hardin left his childhood home in rural Kentucky. Grappling with an AIDS diagnosis, he returns to care for his dying father. Told from the perspectives of Raphael, his family, and their lifelong neighbor, Fenton Johnson's landmark novel reveals the blood struggles and binding loves of a broken family made whole. First published in 1994.

DVD. "Newsreels, commercials, and home movies are used to study the life and influence of Anita Bryant"--IMDb. This disc is a recorded DVD and may fail to play on some DVD equipment. Letter written and read by Fenton Johnson.

DVD. Originally broadcast on the PBS series POV on July 11, 2000. In 1967 Canadian filmmaker Hugh O'Connor came with a crew to eastern Kentucky to make a film showing people from all walks of life in the United States. They finished the day by filming coal miners and their families in rental houses. As the filmmakers were leaving, Hobart Ison, the owner of the property, drove up and fired three shots, killing Hugh O'Connor. Elizabeth Barrett, from Kentucky herself, explores why this happened by trying to understand the people and culture of eastern Kentucky. Narration written by Fenton Johnson.

DVD. Documents Mexican and Mexican American observances of Los Días de Muertos. Emphasizes the enduring meaningfulness of practices and beliefs regarding death which appear pre-Columbian in origin. A film by Lourdes Portillo and Susana Muñoz ; produced and directed by Lourdes Portillo and Susana Muñoz ; co-producer, Emiko Omori ; written by Lourdes Portillo, Fenton Johnson, B. Ruby Rich.

The Little Colonel series, book 1. During the early part of the 20th century the Little Colonel series was the most popular series for children. Published in 1895, this is the first in the series of books about Lloyd Sherman, the Little Colonel. A spunky little girl who lives on her grandfather's farm in Kentucky reunites a fragmented family after the Civil War.

The Little Colonel series, book 2. Published in 1899, this is another book in the ""Little Colonel"" series about a young girl, Lloyd Sherman, and her friends and family, who live in the post-Civil War South.

The Little Colonel series, book 3. As one of the gifts for her eleventh birthday Lloyd Sherman, the Little Colonel, is given permission to hold her very own house party.She invites her closest friends from all over the country--Eugenia Forbes of New York City, Joyce Ware of Plainsville, Kansas, and Beth Lewis of Jaynes, Kentucky--to her home in Lloydsboro Valley, Kentucky for her special event. Over the course of the weekend the four girls learn that, though they are very different, they all have much in common, and also teach each other the true meaning of friendship. First published in 1900.

The Little Colonel series, book 4. Following her successful house party, Lloyd Sherman, the Little Colonel,finds her friends returning to their homes as the end of the summer approaches,signaling the beginning of the school year. While Joyce, Eugenia, and Betty return to their homes, the Little Colonel begins to regret having met her friends, due to the loneliness of having to lose them again.But as Christmas approaches, the Little Colonel finds herself volunteering at the children's hospital where, through her dying friend, Dot, she learns the true meaning of the holidays and of friendship. First published in 1901.

The Little Colonel series, book 5. "In this entry in the Little Colonel series, Lloyd Sherman, the title character, leaves her Kentucky home with her parents on an adventure that takes her across the Atlantic and through Europe. While in Geneva, the Little Colonel meets Major Pierre de Vaux and his magnificent, specially trained St. Bernard, Hero. Throughout the trip, Hero's experiences in and relationship to the Red Cross prompt friends and strangers alike to share their stories of being helped by the organization. What begins as a birthday vacation becomes much, much more, as the Little Colonel learns about the notions of compassion, duty, and sacrifice from the most unlikely of heroes." --Goodreads. First published in 1902.

The Little Colonel series, book 6. Lloyd Sherman, the Little Colonel, from Locust, Kentucky, is sent to boarding school when her grandfather, the Old Colonel, becomes ill. This story describes Lloyd's merry times at Lloydsboro Seminary with her friends, including Ida Shane, and the lessons she learns about family honor

The Little Colonel series, book 7. Joyce and the Ware family have made a new home near Camelback Mountain in Arizona, but Joyce is having a difficult time making the adjustment to desert life. She writes the Little Colonel, who comes to visit and has her first real taste of romance in the person of the handsome and personable Phil Tremont.

The Little Colonel series, book 8. The vivacious Lloyd Sherman, better remembered as the Little Colonel, is growing up. As usual, this process brings both pleasure and pain into her life. In this book Lloyd's adventures lead her,along with her best friends, to Warwick Hall, a lovely old boarding school in Washington, D.C., where they will have wonderful times together. When Christmas break comes along, Lloyd and her friends are filled with excitement over all of the parties and dances that they will attend. Christmas break is sure to bring Lloyd happiness, but with it also comes painful disappointment. Will she ever be allowed to return to her beloved friends and school? Annie Fellows Johnston skillfully recreates the difficulties and joys that are a part of becoming a woman. For generations (starting with The Little Colonel , also published by Pelican), the adventures of Lloyd Sherman and her fun-loving friends have won readers' hearts. The Little Colonel stories prove that although times have changed, essential human qualities have not. First published in 1905.

The Little Colonel series, book 9. The Little Colonel is back, and this time she's a maid of honor. Her friend Eugenia is getting married, and the whole wedding party has come to stay at Lloyd's house. The old fashioned term for this kind of extended sleep-over/get-together is a "house party." Reading Ms. Johnston's version of the delightful events leading up to the wedding is like traveling back to the time of slow summer days and long, white cotton dresses.In this story readers will be introduced to Mary Ware, the wild girl from Arizona who has traveled all the way to Kentucky for the festivities. Her untamed western ways make her an endearing character. Handsome young men, moonlit boat rides, and evening walks through the woods delight Lloyd and her dear friends as much as they do the reader. Perhaps Lloyd will even find the beginnings of love. First published in 1906.

The Little Colonel series, book 10. "When she wrote this, Annie Fellows Johnston intended it to be the conclusion of the Little Colonel series. Of course, as it turned out, that would not be quite true. The stories continued, albeit through a somewhat different perspective, in the Mary Ware series. Only recently the maid of honor, now it will be the Little Colonel's turn to be the bride, at least that much of it we can give away! But who will it be? A "Knight Comes Riding" in every chapter, but who will finally measure up to the silver yardstick? Will it be one of our old friends, like Little Knight of Kentucky Malcolm MacIntyre, or perhaps Rob Moore, Alex Shelby, Phil Tremont, Jack Ware . . . they are all in the running! Or maybe it will be a new Knight that comes riding! You'll have to read the story to find out!" --Goodreads. First published in 1907.

The Little Colonel series, book 11. "With Mary Ware's acceptance into Warwick Hall, a prestigious boarding school that had previously educated Lloyd Sherman, the Little Colonel, she quickly becomes a favored student with the headmistress, Madame Chartley. Madame Chartley grants Mary Ware the honor of living in the Little Colonel's old dorm room, shared by fellow Warwick Hall student Ethelinda Hurst. Mary Ware, the naive, unabashed, enthusiastic young woman from the deserts of Arizona, and Ethelinda Hurst, a spoiled, aristocratic brat from the suburbs of Chicago, affect and influence each others' characters more than either could have predicted as they age and mature into proper young women." --Goodreads. First published in 1908.

The Little Colonel series, book 12. First published in 1910.

The Little Colonel series, book 13. First published in 1912.

Digital reproduction. First published in 1902.

Fiction. Big brothers understand that their little baby brothers and sisters must do some things differently until they get older.

First published in 1898.

Excerpt: ...inherited was handed over to her then, and I think she has visions of my wearing it on the same stage, on the occasion of my Commencement. There are only a few strands in the necklace and the pearls are quite small, though exquisitely beautiful, but, of course, I couldnt wear it with just a plain shirt-waist. Easter has come and gone, and nothing of importance has happened here at school, but a letter from Barby brings news of happenings at home which have a place in this record, so I am copying it. "What a cold and snowy Spring this has been All week we have had to pile on the wood as we do in midwinter. I am glad that you are away from this bleak tongue of sand, far enough inland and far enough South to escape these cold winds from the Atlantic, and to have Spring buds 166 and Spring bird-calls in the school garden. "Yesterday, just before supper, while I sat knitting in the firelight, the front doorbell rang. Not hearing Tippy go out into the hall, I started to answer it. You know how she opens a door by degrees, one cautious inch and then another." First published in 1918.

Fiction. Indiana-born author Annie Fellows Johnston was the creator of several series of children's books that attained widespread popularity in the early twentieth century. The charming novel Georgina of the Rainbows will cast an enchanting spell on girls looking for something more timeless and classic than the tween drama and supernatural fluff passed off as juvenile fiction these days. First published in 1916.

Fiction. First published in 1896.

An inspirational story about the value of perseverance along the road to success by the author of The Little Colonel series. Originally published in 1904, this small book relates the story of Shapur, a salt merchant traveling across the desert to sell his wares at the palace of the Rajah. Along the way, misfortune overcomes Shapur and he is faced with decisions that change his life.

Fiction. Digital reproduction.

Fiction. First published in 1899.

Fiction. Digital reproduction.

First published in 1897.

Fiction. Digital reproduction.

In this refreshingly innovative collection of sketches, author Annie F. Johnston introduces a motley crew of five characters. Although all five are at vastly different phases and stages in their lives, the tales are yoked together by a unifying thread of humanity. First published in 1911.

Reprinted from the Register of the Kentucky Historical Society.

"This book has been compiled from the scrap book of Mary Hall Carr. When, in the summer of 1984, eight women gathered to form "The Little Colonel Doll Collectors", they decided to have a book made for each member with all the information gathered from Mary's collection."--Page 1.

Catalog of books written by Annie Fellows Johnston. Contains brief biography on page 2.

Archival material; housed at Berea College, Berea, Kentucky. The collection consists of the unpublished manuscript of A Mountain Mailbag, correspondence, and photographs.

DVD; approx. 81 minutes. Originally issued in b & w version as a motion picture in 1935. Black & white or color viewing options. Based on the story "The little colonel" by Annie Fellows Johnston. An old-fashioned Southern colonel has disowned his daughter for marrying a Yankee and resists all entreaties for a reconciliation until he succumbs to the charms of his little granddaughter.

Here is Gayl Jones's classic novel, the tale of blues singer Ursa, consumed by her hatred of the nineteenth-century slave master who fathered both her grandmother and mother. 'History and fiction have yielded little about those black slave women who were mistress and breeder to their white owners. There are some facts and figures, but they tell us nothing about the women themselves: their motives, their emotions, and the memories they passed on to their children. Gayl Jones's first novel is a gripping portrait of this harsh sexual and psychological genealogy ... Jones's language is subtle and sinewy, and her imagination sure. 'Everything said in the beginning must be said better than in the beginning.' Ursa (Corregidora) vows. Gayl Jones fulfills that pledge.'--Margo Jefferson, Newsweek. First published in 1975.

Other titles: The Birdwatcher. Published in Germany.

Imprisoned for the bizarre murder of her lover, Eva Medina Canada recalls a life tormented by sexual abuse and emotional violence. Eva's Man is Gayl Jones's second novel. "Eva's Man is a gripping psychological portrait of a woman unable to love for fear of pain. Imprisoned for the bizarre murder of her lover, Eva Median Canada weaves together memory and fantasy to reveal a life tormented by the brutality of sexual abuse and emotional silence. Brilliantly experimenting with language, Jones infuses her graphic and powerful narrative of the triple yoke of race, class, and gender with a rich musical and oral idiom."--Amazon. First published in 1976.

Harlan Jane Eagleton is a faith healer, traveling by bus to small towns, converting skeptics, restoring minds and bodies. But before that she was a minor rock star's manager, and before that a beautician. She's had a fling with her rock star's ex-husband and an Afro-German horse dealer; along the way she's somehow lost her own husband, a medical anthropologist now traveling with a medicine woman in Africa. Harlan tells her story from the end backwards, drawing us constantly deeper into her world and the mystery at the heart of her tale - the story of her first healing. The Healing is a lyrical and at times humorous exploration of the struggle to let go of pain, anger, and even love. Slipping seamlessly back through Harlan's memories in a language rich with the textured cadences of the black Southerner, Gayl Jones weaves her story to its dramatic - and unexpected - beginning.

Sojourner Nadine Jane Johnson (also known as Mosquito), is an African-American truck driver who challenges us to understand & accept the importance of self-identity & differences in a world that insistently places limits on individual expression & culture. Set in a south Texas border town, Mosquito is the story of Nadine's accidental & increasing involvement in the new underground railroad, a sanctuary movement for Mexican immigrants, of her intense friendships with Delgadina, her Chicana bartender, with Monkey Bread, her childhood pal, with Maria, whose baby is nearly born in the back of her truck, & of her intensifying romance with Ray, a gentle revolutionary.

"The epic rendering of a Black woman's journey through slavery and liberation, set in 17th-century colonial Brazil. "Palmares" recounts the journey of Almeyda, a Black slave girl who comes of age on Portuguese plantations and escapes to a fugitive slave settlement called Palmares. Following its destruction, Almeyda embarks on a journey across colonial Brazil to find her husband lost in battle. Her story brings to life a world impacted by greed, conquest, and colonial desire. She encounters a mad lexicographer, desperate to avoid military service; a village that praises a god living in a nearby cave; and a medicine woman who offers great magic, at a greater price."

A collection of twelve provocative short stories, first published in 1977, explores the emotional and intellectual lives of a a diverse cast of characters, in such tales as The Women, The Coke Factory, Jevata, and White Rat, which deals with the identity and relationship issues confronting a black man who can pass for white. Reprint.

The powerful novelist here turns penetrating critic, giving us in lively style both trenchant literary analysis and fresh insight on the art of writing. When African American writers began to trust the literary possibilities of their own verbal and musical creations, writes Gayl Jones, they began to transform the European and European American models, and to gain greater artistic sovereignty. The vitality of African American literature derives from its incorporation of traditional oral forms: folktales, riddles, idiom, jazz rhythms, spirituals, and blues. Jones traces the development of this literature as African American writers, celebrating their oral heritage, developed distinctive literary forms. The twentieth century saw a new confidence and deliberateness in African American work: the move from surface use of dialect to articulation of a genuine black voice; the move from blacks portrayed for a white audience to characterization relieved of the need to justify. Innovative writing such as Charles Waddell Chesnutt's depiction of black folk culture, Langston Hughes's poetic use of blues, and Amiri Baraka's recreation of the short story as a jazz piece redefined Western literary tradition. For Jones, literary technique is never far removed from its social and political implications. She documents how literary form is inherently and intensely national, and shows how the European monopoly on acceptable forms for literary art stifled American writers both black and white. Jones is especially eloquent in describing the dilemma of the African American writers: to write from their roots yet retain a universal voice; to merge the power and fluidity of oral tradition with the structure needed for written presentation. With this work Gayl Jones has added a new dimension to African American literary history.

Poetry. This exquisite book-length poem is set in colonial Brazil, following the destruction of Palmares, the last of seven fugitive slave enclaves beset by the Portuguese. Amid the flight and reenslavement of its inhabitants emerges the love story of Anninho and Almeyda, former African slaves. Song for Anninho offers readers some of Gayl Jones's very best verse. First published in 1981.

Poems; 75 pages.

Poems; 70 pages.

With an introduction by Wade Hall, Morris Grubbs has sifted through vintage classics, little-known gems, and stunning debuts to assemble this collection of forty stories by popular and critically acclaimed writers. In subtle and profound ways they challenge and overturn accepted stereotypes about the land their authors call home, whether by birth or by choice. Kentucky writers have produced some of the finest short stories published in the last fifty years, much of which focuses on the tension between the comforts of community and the siren-like lure of the outside world. Arranged chronologically, from Robert Penn Warren's "Blackberry Winter" to Crystal E. Wilkinson's "Humming Back Yesterday," these stories are linked by their juxtaposition of departures and returns, the familiar and the unknown, home and beyond. Contributors: Robert Penn Warren, Caroline Gordon, James Still, Jane Mayhall, Elizabeth Hardwick, Dean Cadle, Jesse Stuart, Billy C. Clark, Janice Holt Giles, A.B. Guthrie, Jr., Hollis Summers, Ed McClanahan, Sallie Bingham, Robert Hazel, Jack Cady, Jim Wayne Miller, David Madden, Gayl Jones, Jane Stuart, Gurney Norman, Walter Tevis, Bobbie Ann Mason, Joe Ashby Porter, Leon V. Driskell, Mary Ann Taylor-Hall, Richard Cortez Day, Sena Jeter Naslund, Pat Carr, Wendell Berry, James Baker Hall, Lisa Koger, Barbara Kingsolver, Normandi Ellis, Guy Davenport, Kim Edwards, Chris Holbrook, Paul Griner, Chris Offutt, Dwight Allen, Crystal E. Wilkinson. Edited by Morris Allen Grubbs; with an introduction by Wade Hall and an afterword by Charles E. May.

Presents a literary study of three black women writers. This book examines the 'inter-American' characteristics in the work of Paule Marshall, Toni Morrison, and Gayl Jones, including discussions of Morrison's Song of Solomon and Tar Baby, Jones' Corregidora and Song of Anninho, and Marshall's The Chosen Place, The Timeless People.

Arguing that the fundamental, familiar, sexual violence of slavery and racialized subjugation have continued to shape black and white subjectivities into the present, Christina Sharpe interprets African diasporic and Black Atlantic visual and literary texts that address those "monstrous intimacies" and their repetition as constitutive of post-slavery subjectivity. Her illuminating readings juxtapose Frederick Douglass's narrative of witnessing the brutal beating of his Aunt Hester with Essie Mae Washington-Williams's declaration of freedom in Dear Senator: A Memoir by the Daughter of Strom Thurmond, as well as the "generational genital fantasies" depicted in Gayl Jones's novel Corregidora with a firsthand account of such "monstrous intimacies" in the journals of an antebellum South Carolina senator, slaveholder, and vocal critic of miscegenation. Sharpe explores the South African-born writer Bessie Head's novel Maru--about race, power, and liberation in Botswana--in light of the history of the KhoiSan woman Saartje Baartman, who was displayed in Europe as the "Hottentot Venus" in the nineteenth century. Reading Isaac Julien's film The Attendant, Sharpe takes up issues of representation, slavery, and the sadomasochism of everyday black life. Her powerful meditation on intimacy, subjection, and subjectivity culminates in an analysis of Kara Walker's black silhouettes, and the critiques leveled against both the silhouettes and the artist.

As a poet, playwright, novelist, short-story writer, and critic, Gayl Jones has always resisted labels in her quest to find a liberating voice for black women and herself. With a poet's lyricism and a musician's ear for rhythm, she continually seeks new ways to confront the barriers, traumas, insecurities, and prejudices oppressing black women, and, by extension, all women. After the Pain: Critical Essays on Gayl Jones is the first comprehensive collection of essays dedicated solely to the exploration of Jones's work. Ranging from analyses of her use of language and music to reevaluations of her representation of sexuality and gender roles to examinations of the oft-overlooked connections between Latin America and African Americans, each of these essays investigates Jones's desire to continually complicate the process of identity formation.

Gayl Jones is dedicated to the art of "verbal authenticity," stemming from her identification with her African American heritage. Amid widespread critical praise as well as pointed attacks for her controversial first two novels, Jones has shown a constantly evolving cultural consciousness. This first single-author study of Gayl Jones recovers the work of an under-examined yet immensely skillful contemporary writer. It offers a thorough examination of her technical innovations as well as her willingness to explore controversial subject matter. The book addresses such crucial themes as Afrocentrism, diasporas, mythopoesis, post-colonialism and globalization, and offers close readings of the aesthetic and political interchanges within Jones's fiction, drama, poetry, and criticism. Two interviews with Gayl Jones are included.

We live in a world of talk. Yet Race Sounds argues that we need to listen more--not just hear things, but actively listen--particularly in relation to how we engage race, gender, and class differences. Forging new ideas about the relationship between race and sound, Furlonge explores how black artists--including well-known figures such as writers Ralph Ellison and Zora Neale Hurston, and singers Bettye LaVette and Aretha Franklin, among others--imagine listening. Drawing from a multimedia archive, Furlonge examines how many of the texts call on readers to "listen in print." In the process, she gives us a new way to read and interpret these canonical, aurally inflected texts, and demonstrates how listening allows us to engage with the sonic lives of difference as readers, thinkers, and citizens. Intervening in discourses of African American and black feminist literatures, where sound and voice dominate, Furlonge shifts our attention to listening as an aural strategy of cultural, social, and civic engagement that not only enlivens how we read, write, and critique texts, but also informs how we might be more effective audiences for each other and against injustice in our midst. The result is a fascinating examination that brings new insights to African American literature and art, American literature, democratic philosophy, and sound studies.
Named persons: Zora Neale Hurston; Sterling A Brown; Ralph Ellison; Gayl Jones; David Bradley.

This unique volume provides each writers reflection on her work, an evaluation of that writer by two perceptive critics, and detailed biographical and bibliographical data. Included are Maya Angelou; Toni Cade Bambara; Alice Childress; Mari Evan; Nikki Giovanni; Gayl Jones; Audre Lorde; Toni Morrison; Carolyn Rodgers; Margaret Walker; Gwendolyn Brooks; Lucille Clifton; Sonia Sanchez; Alice Walker; Paule Marshall.

Ph. D. dissertation from Bowling Green State University.

Ph. D. dissertation from Washington State University.

Masters thesis from the University of California.

Masters thesis from Ohio State University.

Masters thesis from Florida State University.

This extraordinary reference series provides biographical profiles of important persons of African heritage whether they are personalities from the news, selected 20th-century notables, or individuals who are not yet household names. Each volume of Contemporary Black Biography contains 55 full-length biographies, Name, occupation, nationality and subject indexes are included in each volume.
Volume 37: John Akomfrah; Charles Edward Anderson; Ashanti; Kofi Awoonor; Paris Barclay; Patricia E Bath; Maureen Blackwood; Art Blakey; Jean Breeze; Todd Bridges; Marlin Briscoe; Marie Maynard Daly; Ruth A Davis; Anita DeFrantz; Brazeal Dennard; James DePriest; Gary Dourdan; Cyprian Ekwensi; Roy Eldridge; Lorris Elliott; Howard L Fuller; Benny Golson; Fred D Gray; Wilton D Gregory; Julian Henriques; Jay Higginbotham; J J Johnson; Linton Kwesi Johnson; Gayl Jones; Jackie Kay; Ulysses Kay; Etheridge Knight; Kool Moe Dee, (Musician); Rosetta LeNoire; Ludacris, (Rapper); Paula Madison; Edward Archibald Markham; Albert Memmi; Thomas Mofolo; Paul Mooney; Musiq Soulchild; Odetta; Adebayo Ogunlesi; Gabriel Okara; Jerry Oliver; C Everard Palmer; Florence B Price; Aishah Rahman; Sonny Rollins; Chanda Rubin; Jimmy Rushing; Al-Tayyib Salih; Olive Senior; Stuff Smith; William Grant Still; Maxine Sulllivan; Ann Graves Tanksley; Melvin B Tolson; Eamonn Walker; George Walker; Andre Ware; Afaa M Weaver; Kirk Whalum; Lester Young.

Pictorial work; 100 pages. Edited by Wendy Ewald; foreword by Robert Coles; text by Loyal Jones; [photos by Lyn Adams and others].

Juvenile works; 144 pages, illustrations. Contents: Introduction -- Appalachian Values -- Religion -- Independence, Self-reliance and Pride -- Neighborliness -- Familism -- Personalism -- Humility and Modesty -- Love of Place -- Patriotism -- Sense of Beauty -- Sense of Humor -- Warren Brunner.

This volume is an encyclopedia of country music performers who have used comedy as a central component of their presentation. Loyal Jones offers a conversational and informative biographical sketch of each performer, often including a sample of the musician's humor, a recording history, and amusing anecdotal tidbits. In an entertaining style, Jones covers performers throughout the twentieth century, from such early stars of vaudeville and radio barn dances as the Skillet Lickers and the Weaver Brothers and Elviry, to regulars on Hee Haw and the Grand Old Opry, continuing to current comedians such as the Austin Lounge Lizards, Ray Stevens, and Jeff Foxworthy.

Never have so many missionaries been sent to save so many Christians as is the case in the Southern Uplands. The area has long been perceived by American Christians in contradictory ways: on the one hand, as an unchurched area with people who have little religion or an inadequate faith; on the other, as part of the Bible Belt, packed with small breakaway fundamentalist churches and wild-eyed believers. In Faith and Meaning, one of Appalachian religion's most eloquent spokesmen reveals a people devoted to and thoughtful about their religion, and profoundly influenced by it. Loyal Jones's three decades of conversations and interviews, supplemented by documents such as sermons, testimonies, and articles of faith, articulate Southern Upland views on basic issues of the human condition--faith, God, the world, the Word, and the devil--as well as on community issues such as racial integration and women in the church. In their own voices these people describe their beliefs, their churches, and their lives, exposing a deep conviction tempered with humanity and humor.

It is said that Bascom Lamar Lunsford would "cross hell on a rotten rail to get a folk song" -- his Southern highlands folk-song compilations now constitute one of the largest collections of its kind in the Library of Congress -- but he did much more than acquire songs. He preserved and promoted the Appalachian mountain tradition for generations of people, founding in 1928 the Mountain Dance and Folk Festival in Asheville, North Carolina, an annual event that has shaped America's festival movement. Loyal Jones pens a lively biography of a man considered to be Appalachian music royalty. He also includes a "Lunsford Sampler" of ballads, songs, hymns, tales, and anecdotes, plus a discography of his recordings.Originally published: Boone, N.C. : Appalachian Consortium Press, ©1984. With new introduction. "A compilation of Lunsford's music" (unacc. or melodies with chord symbols): p. [191]-249.

We were going down the road, and we came to this house. There was a little boy standing by the road just crying and crying. We stopped, and we heard the biggest racket you ever heard up in the house. /What (TM)s the matter, son? /Why, Maw and Paw are up there fightin (TM). /Who is your Paw, son? /Well, that (TM)s what they are fightin (TM) over. Brimming with ballads, stories, riddles, tall tales, and great good humor, My Curious and Jocular Heroes pays homage to four people who guided and inspired Loyal Jones (TM)s own study of Appalachian culture. His sharp-eyed portraits introduce a new generation to Bascom Lunsford, the pioneer behind the /memory collections of song and story at Columbia University and the Library of Congress; the Sorbonne-educated collector and performer Josiah H. Combs; Cratis D. Williams, the legendary father of Appalachian studies; and the folklorist and master storyteller Leonard W. Roberts. Throughout, Jones highlights the tales, songs, jokes, and other collected nuggets that define the breadth of each man (TM)s research and repertoire.

Biography; revised edition. 189 pages, illustrations.

Conference papers and proceedings; 181 pages.

From the people ot the Appalachian Mountains comes a special brand of humor dry, colorful and earthy, aimed sometimes at the hillbilly's own foibles, but often at the outside world's pretenses, too.

Appalachian humor can be dry, colorful, and earthy. The chapters vary greatly ranging from topics of Love and Marriage; Schools, Religion; Lawyers; Mountaineers and the Law; Animals and Hunting; Mountaineers and City Folks; Health and Medicine; and Rural Life. In Curing the Cross-Eyed Mule, songwriter Billy Edd Wheeler and folklorist Loyal Jones have combined to give you the biggest serving of Appalachian mountain humor since their bestselling Laughter in Appalachia.

Gathers humorous anecdotes from rural and small-town America about religion, doctors, lawyers, school, politics, farming, and alcohol.

This surprisingly reverent collection of religious humor pokes less at the message than at the messenger. Gentle enough to give your preacher, clean enough to use in the pulpit, this volume is nonetheless sharp enough to drive home its point that the clergyman does well to serve rather than be served.

The phenomenal success of Laughter in Appalachia, Loyal Jones and Billy Edd Wheeler's first collection of humor, says something about the importance of humor in our lives, and the talent Jones and Wheeler have in finding the best of it. More Laughter in Appalachia, their fourth collection of Southern mountain humor, may well be their funniest and most comprehensive collection to date. Packed with humorous jokes, anecdotes, poems, riddles, and songs, not to mention a nineteenth-century ....

Contents: Appalachian speech -- The R in mountain speech -- Vowels and diphthongs in mountain speech -- Rhythm and melody in mountain speech -- The content of mountain speech -- Verbs in mountaineer speech -- Mountaineers mind their manners -- Metaphor in mountain speech -- Prepositions in mountain speech -- Subtlety in mountain speech -- Appendix I: A word list from the mountains of Kentucky and North Carolina -- Appendix II: Glossary of mountain speech -- Appendix III: Sayings : similes and metaphors -- Glossary sources -- Bibliography.

Folk Tales delighted and instructed children five hundred years ago. We believe that they can still delight and inform the children of today. Some tales were "collected by a pioneering folklorist, Leonard W. Roberts, who gathered a great body of tales mostly from the Appalachian third of Kentucky ... Several others are from James Taylor Adams, who collected tales from his family and neighbors for the Virginia Writers Project ... These tales are included ... [from the James Taylor Adams collection] of the John Cook Wyllie Library of the University of Virginia's College at Wise."--Page 7-8. Contents: Ezell and the black-speckled gizzard stone / by Aileen Kilgore Henderson -- Raglif Jaglif Tetartlif Pole / by Leonard W. Roberts -- The three gold nuts / by James Taylor Adams -- Ashpet's dreams / by Brenda Gough -- Little Esmond / by Patty Reese -- Nail soup / by Bob Rennick -- The boy who wanted gold / by James Taylor Adams -- Cheese and quackers / by Anne Shelby -- Mutsmeg / by Loyal Jones -- Robin Hood, mountain man / by James Taylor Adams -- Jack goes a-hunting / by Loyal Jones -- Through thick and thin / by James Taylor Adams.

DVD; approx. 53 minutes. Originally presented as an episode of the television program The Appalachians in 2005. The first segment in a 3-part series exploring the political, economic, musical, and spiritual history of the Appalachian region. Part 1 examines the sophisticated culture of the Cherokee Indians, and the arrival of Europeans, focusing on the influx of Scots-Irish immigrants, their crucial role in the American Revolution and their equally defiant stance against the U.S. government during the Whiskey Rebellion. The Appalachian origins of country music from old world folk tunes are also examined, with attention to the influences of African-American and revivalist religious culture.

DVD; approx. 53 minutes. Originally presented as an episode of the television program The Appalachians in 2005. The third segment in a 3-part series exploring the political, economic, musical, and spiritual history of the Appalachian region. Part 3 examines the 20th century history of Appalachia through the prisms of economic hardship, spiritual perseverance, the region's rich musical heritage and the rise of modern country music by way of radio and phonograph. It also highlights the resonance of long-standing church traditions and documents the Appalachian experience in connection with major historical events : the Great depression, the New Deal, The WPA, the Tennessee Valley Authority, strip mining, the migration of mountain people to the mid-West and LBJ's war on poverty.

History, biography, anecdotes; approx. 331 pages.

Special issue of Appalachian Heritage in honor of Loyal Jones; June, 1994. 104 pages.

DVD video; approx. 28 minutes. "Loyal Jones, founder and former director of Berea College's Appalachian Center, and current director Chad Berry discuss the center's work and mission, national media coverage about Appalachia, and the future of the region."

Volume collects transcripts from four oral history interviews. Named persons: Billy F Best; Margaret Dotson; Loyal Jones; and Al White, (Fiddler).

Riley is awful at sports. He wants to quit the baseball team, but his dad won't let him give up. So when one badswing brings a three-legged dog into his life, Riley feelslike he's been thrown a curveball. How can he take careof a dog and make his dad proud?Champ is a former champion show dog. But when theaccident that leaves him with Riley also leaves him withjust three legs, this dog has to learn some new tricks. CanChamp show Riley that winning doesn't always meancoming in first?Together, Riley and Champ make a great team. But not everyone thinks so. Unless Riley comes up with a plan,he and Champ could be separated--forever. This timequitting is not an option.

Parker has always wanted a pet, but when he gets a guinea pig, it causes him more trouble than he anticipated.

There is a leprechan on the loose in the classroom and Sidney is the only one who can see him.

Poor Logan. He always seems to be getting into trouble. Fifth grade will be different. That is until Grandpa moves in. Grandpa is becoming more and more forgetful and Logan doesn't want him doing embarrassing things? Especially in front of his friends. He doesn't want his parents to send Grandpa away either. Then there is Emily Scott. She's had it in for Logan since the first day of school. She is trying to set him up so he looks like he turned ratfink on his best friend, Malik. And when Emily produces an embarrassing photo of Logan, will he really turn "ratfink" to preserve his reputation and save Grandpa?

In the last little village right before the North Pole, there lived a boy named Jack. No one paid attention to Jack--until one day, when Jack finds his own very special talent and becomes known as...Jack Frost! A fresh and imaginative retelling of the winter myth of Jack Frost!

Sound Recording. Audiocassette, analog. Presents an interview with Debbie Dadey and Marcia Thornton Jones, authors of the Bailey School kids series and Triplet trouble books. The authors talk about how they get ideas for books, how they write books, and what the authors do when they are not writing.