Although we first think of New Orleans as a place of jazz, food, and bacchanalia, my longtime partner Denise and I discovered on a recent trip that the richness of the city includes books as well.
As mentioned in the previous posting, we began our preparation for a trip to the Crescent City by reading Rebecca Solnit and Rebecca Snedeker’s Unfathomable City: A New Orleans Atlas (2013). It’s a book that delves into the intricate history and culture of a city that has been referred to as an “erogenous zone below the Bible Belt of the South.” Included in our prep, we also listened to the audio version of Walker Percy’s 1962 Pulitzer prize winning The Moviegoer read by Christopher Hurt. I read the novel twice before, but Hurt’s rendering gave me a whole new sense of the narrator Binx Bolling’s timeless malaise.
Here’s a few of the literary treasures we stumbled upon during our short visit:
Denise visited this charming store while touring the Garden District. It has extensive inventory on many Southern writers, James Parker, Anne Rice, John Kennedy Toole, and the person who brought O’Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces from unpublished obscurity to prominence -- Walker Percy.
Denise purchased two books while there: All Dat: New Orleans Eating, Drinking, Listening to Music, Exploring & Celebrating in the Crescent City (2018) by Michael Murphy (which we immediately put into good use) and the novel The Mercy of Thin Air (2006 ) by Ronlyn Domingue, which is set in 1920s New Orleans.
This French Quarter luxury hotel, which is has been owned by the same family for five generations may be known as much for its revolving Carousal Bar (pictured above) than literary heritage, but the lobby and the restaurant have permanent exhibits featuring some of the books and manuscripts of literary giants who had stayed there, such as William Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, Richard Ford, and Truman Capote. It seems fitting that Solnit and Snedeker first met at the Carousal Bar to discuss creating Unfathomable City.
The Stacks Art and Design Bookstore
In the Arts district near the colossal World War II Museum, this bookstore is well-curated with all kinds of quirky books including many of Solnit’s recent efforts. Located in the Contemporary Art Center, the shop stocks books that mixes the written word with contemporary art, theory and design. The shop carries cookbooks, children books, magazines and stationery. I purchased a copy of Marshall McLuhan essays edited by Richard Cavell and Denise (shown below as a woman of literary intrigue) purchased Moth Presents All These Wonders: True Stories About Facing the Unknown (2017). As new grandparents, we especially liked one card that read: Although frowned upon, it is not illegal to call a toddler an asshole.
Such is the effect of New Orleans on one’s sensibilities.
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