Last year, I had a running series on this blog that I called The Quotable South. It was about one-part PSA (below-the-Mason/Dixon information campaign) and two-parts personal therapy (as I had just returned down South after 6 years in the Northeast). Anyway, a good friend of mine and semi-regular contributor to this blog, Dr. Trott…
Read MoreThe quote above is from the Jim Jarmusch film “Mystery Train.” In my experience, this is the quote that people most often associate with our strange city. However, as a Memphian, I’ve always thought that another line from the Jarmusch film was a much more apt description of the Memphis experience. My favorite line comes…
Read MoreStorytelling and copulation are the two main forms of amusement in the South. They’re both inexpensive and easily procured. —Robert Penn Warren So, this entry is a bit of an elaboration on some of the things I already covered in The Quotable South, Part 6: The Drawl, but a recent conversation reminded me that there…
Read MoreIt means, “I love you. And I’m sorry for what you are going through and I will share as much of your burden as I can.” And maybe potato salad is a better way to say it. –Will D. Campbell, on the tendency of Southerners to bring food to families in mourning If someone asked…
Read MoreI think it is safe to say that while the South is hardly Christ-centered, it is most certainly Christ-haunted. –Flannery O’Connor First of all, if you aren’t familiar with Flannery O’Connor, by all means stop reading this immediately and go find yourself a copy of A Good Man is Hard to Find. Make sure you’re…
Read MoreMy father would say that the only difference between Mississippi (which was a dry state) and its neighbor Tennessee, which was wet, was that in Tennessee a man could not buy liquor on a Sunday. –Willie Morris I’ve always been perplexed by the differences in blue laws from state to state. Blue laws are designed…
Read MoreI would venture to say that loudly denouncing Emmylou Harris will get you killed in any establishment that serves liquor south of Delaware. –Steve Earle Ahhhh, Steve Earle. For all his piss-and-vinegar-laden griping about Nashville, he still will stand up and pick a fight with anyone who hasn’t earned the right to criticize its ambassadors…
Read MoreA Southerner speaks music.–Mark Twain Southerners can probably say “shit” better than anybody else. We give it the ol’ two-syllable “shee-yet,” which strings it out quite a bit and gives it more ambience, if words can have ambience.–Lewis Grizzard If you are going to be underestimated by people who speak more rapidly, the temptation is…
Read MoreEvery Southerner alive, at many, many points in his or her childhood, heard the words, “But what will people think?”–Julia Reed I love this quote by Julia Reed (author of The Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena). I used to say that the structure of the Southerner’s psyche is different from the…
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