THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, December 18, 1994 TAG: 9412140405
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J2 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Book Review
SOURCE: BY BARRETT R. RICHARDSON
LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
ROY BLOUNT'S BOOK OF SOUTHERN HUMOR
Edited by ROY BLOUNT JR.
W.W. Norton & Co. 668 pp. $27.50.
ON THE NIGHT THE HOGS ATE WILLIE
And Other Quotations on All Things Southern
Edited by BARBARA BINSWANGER and JIM CHARLTON
Dutton. 192 pp. 17.95.
Roy Blount Jr. assembles in his Book of Southern Humor an entertaining, encyclopedic array of full-blown short stories, anecdotes, yarns and lyrics - from blues, country and rock music - to distill the essence of the ubiquitous humor that springs from Southern soil and souls.
This delightful treasury contains more than 150 selections garnered from writers who begin with 17th century Virginia's staid William Byrd and include contemporary Florida's zany newspaper columnist Dave Barry as well as non-Southerner Garrison Keillor. Pens Jimmy Rodgers (1897-1933), the Singing Brakeman and Father of Country Music:
``T for Texas, T for Tennessee
T for Thelma, that gal that made a wreck of me. . . ''
Blount looks at such intriguing ``chapters'' as ``Here Be Dragons, or How Come These Butterbeans Have an Alligator Taste?'', featuring critters and cuisine, and ``My People, My People (How's Your Mama 'n' Them?),'' dealing with family matters.
Exercising editor's prerogative, he also includes some of his own material, which certainly qualifies as both Southern and humorous. In ``Song to Oysters,'' for example, he jests:
``I like to eat an uncooked oyster.
Nothing's slicker, nothing's moister.
Nothing's easier on your gorge
Or, when the time comes, to dischorge.
But not to let it too long rest
Within your mouth is always best.
I prefer my oyster fried.
Then I'm sure my oyster's died.''
The book could serve as a fun text for a course in Southern writing. Blount sets the proper uproarious tone when he exposes in his introduction a feature that is typical of Southern humor: ``characters bringing themselves abundantly to life through their fascination with other characters' deplorability.''
Characters and deplorability also figure into On the Night the Hogs Ate Willie, a delightful book of neatly packaged quotes about the South, none of them as original as the title used by editors Barbara Binswanger and Jim Charlton.
Southerners will greet its aphorisms with an exclamatory ``That's right!'' and pronounce it wildly entertaining and a repository of wisdom - sometimes cornball, sometimes profound - that is worth passing on.
Northerners trying to plumb the psyche of the South will find the book educational, helping them to understand the region's sometimes mystifying folkways.
The nearly 800 quotes are organized into categories that include the big ``Cs'' of cuisine, Civil War, culture, climate, civil rights and the c-sounding kudzu. There are also sections on each Southern state: ``They say you should never let a Virginian start talking about his family because you're liable never to shut him up.'' - Earl Hamner.
Other gems:
``The Mason-Dixon Line is the dividing line between cold bread and hot biscuit.'' - Kentucky Gov. Bob Taylor.
``The nice thing about Southerners is the way we enjoy our neuroses.'' - Florence King.
``Southern barbeque is the closest thing we have in the U.S. to Europe's wine and cheeses; drive a hundred miles and the barbeque changes.'' - John Shelton Reed.
``Next to fried food, the South has suffered most from oratory.'' - Walter Hines Page.
``Southern women are Mack trucks disguised as powder puffs.'' - Reynolds Price.
And, oh yes, about the book's intriguing title: It comes from novelist Pat Conroy, whose mother told him Southern literature could be summed up: ``On the night the hogs ate Willie, Mama died when she heard what Daddy did to Sister.'' MEMO: Barrett R. Richardson is a retired staff editor who teaches English part
time at Old Dominion University. by CNB