Reading Seattle: The City in Prose

by Peter Donahue, John Trombold

Overview

Seattle, with its spectacular natural beauty and rough frontier history, has inspired writers from its earliest days. This anthology spans seven decades and includes fiction, memoirs, histories, and journalism that define the city or use it as a setting, imparting the flavor of the city through a literary prism.

Reading Seattle features classics by Horace R. Cayton, Richard Hugo, Betty MacDonald, Mary McCarthy, Murray Morgan, and John Okada as well as more recent works by Sherman Alexie, Lynda Barry, David Guterson, J. A. Jance, Jonathan Raban, and others. It includes cutting-edge work by emerging talents and reintroduces works by important Seattle writers who may have been overlooked in recent years.

The writers featured in this volume explore a variety of neighborhoods and districts within the city, delineating urban spaces and painting memorable portraits of characters both historical and fictional.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780295997254
Publisher:	University of Washington Press
Publication date:	07/20/2015
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.88(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Peter Donahue teaches at Birmingham-Southern College and is the author of many short stories and books, including the novel Madison House. John Trombold teaches at Linfield College in McMinnville, Oregon. Previously, he taught English at a number of Seattle-area schools, including Seattle University, Pacific Lutheran University, Seattle Central Community College, and The Lakeside School. Together, they also edited the book Reading Portland (University of Washington Press and Oregon State Historical Society, 2007).

Table of Contents

Foreword—Charles Johnson

Acknowledgments

Introduction—Peter Donahue

Part 1: Coming into Focus (1930s-1980s)

Northwest Gateway: The Story of the Port of Seattle—Archie Binns

The Executioner Waits—Josephine Herbst

Farthest Reach: Oregon and Washington—Nancy Wilson Ross

Annie Jordan: A Novel of Seattle—Mary Brinker Post

Long Old Road—Horace R. Cayton

How I Grew—Mary McCarthy

Anybody Can Do Anything—Betty MacDonald

Skid Road: An Informal Portrait of Seattle—Murray Morgan

Nisei Daughter—Monica Sone

No-No Boy—John Okada

Seattle, Past to Present—Roger Sale

Digressions of a Native Son—Emmett Watson

The Real West Marginal Way: A Poet's Autobiography—Richard Hugo

Part 2: Many Voices (1980s-1990s)

Still Life with Woodpecker—Tom Robbins

The Rainy City—Earl W. Emerson

Sister of the Road—Barbara Wilson

Seattle's Son—David Guterson

The Good Rain: Across Time and Terrain in the Pacific Northwest—Timothy Egan

Hunting Mister Heartbreak: A Discovery of America—Jonathan Raban

Black Planet: Facing Race during an NBA Season—David Shields

Emerald City: Third & Pike—Charlotte Watson Sherman

Seattle and Vicinity—Colette Brooks

A Good Man—Rebecca Brown

Lying in Wait—J. A. Jance

Rites of Passage: A Memoir of the Sixties in Seattle—Walt Crowley

Street—Jack Cady

Cold Snap—Thom Jones

American Bullfrog—Charles D-Ambrosio

Indian Killer—Sherman Alexie

Blurred Vision: How the Eighties Began in One American Household—Natalia Rachel Singer

Dark Blue Suit—Peter Bacho

Part 3: Unto Itself (1990s-Early 2000s)

A Fair Trade—Michael Byers

Seattle Now: A Letter—Emily Baillargeon Russin

Allan Stein—Matthew Stadler

Sleep Dummy—Matt Briggs

Breaking In—Paisley Rekdal

Cruddy—Lynda Barry

Green Lake—Edwin Weihe

Never Mind Nirvana—Mark Lindquist

Pearl's Secret: A Black Man's Search for His White Family—Neil Henry

The Strangeness of Beauty—Lydia Minatoya

Epilogue—John Trombold

Bibliography

Editorial Reviews

"Donahue and Trombold have compiled a volume that fills a book void, especially in recognizing the outpouring of writing about Seattle in the most recent decade..[They] have worked hard to include many of the city's finest writers over the past 70 years..[and] have also done an admirable job in showcasing many lesser-known but rising talents."

Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Donahue and Trombold have compiled a volume that fills a book void, especially in recognizing the outpouring of writing about Seattle in the most recent decade..[They] have worked hard to include many of the city's finest writers over the past 70 years..[and] have also done an admirable job in showcasing many lesser-known but rising talents.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Donahue and Trombold have compiled a volume that fills a book void, especially in recognizing the outpouring of writing about Seattle in the most recent decade..[They] have worked hard to include many of the city's finest writers over the past 70 years..[and] have also done an admirable job in showcasing many lesser-known but rising talents.

-- "Seattle Post-Intelligencer"

What is here is bracing, informative, and strikingly varied..No matter what your tastes are, the anthology provides a fascinating sense of listening in on the mind of the city, humming away over the decades and coming up with myriad harmonies and discords distinctively its own.

-- "The Seattle Times"

From the Publisher