May 2nd, 2009 / 9:54 am
Author Spotlight

Barry Hannah’s Long Shadow – by Wells Tower

Big giant kudos to Kevin Sampsell for this one. I think I saw it once a while back, but it must have been before I knew who Wells Tower is, and also perhaps before my Hannah-love had reached its present feverpitch. In any case, I’d forgotten about this profile of Hannah that Tower wrote for Garden & Gun magazine, until Kevin posted it on facebook the other day. Good, good man. Also, when you click through, the article isn’t as long as it looks. (Would that it were longer!) The last few screens are Hannah’s short story, “Water Liars.”

Barry Hannah’s fame is of a peculiar kind. Ask people about him, and either they’ll say they’ve never heard the name (despite his nominations for both the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize) or they’ll get a feverish, ecstatic look before they seize you by the lapels and start reeling off cherished passages of his work. Echoes of familiar Southern tropes appear in Hannah’s novels and short stories: outlandish violence, catfish, desperate souls driven half mad by lust and drink. But in Hannah’s fiction the South becomes an alien place, narrated in a dark comic poetry you’ve never heard before, peopled with characters that outflank and outwit the flyspecked conventions of Southern lit. A Civil War scribe whose limbs—save his writing arm—are shot off. A serial killer who looks like Conway Twitty and makes his victim suck a football (“moan around on it some”) before beheading him. A Wild West widow who lashes a personal ad to a buzzard in hopes of finding a man. In Hannah’s panoramas, you’ll find hints of William Faulkner, rumbles of Charles Bukowski, and the tongue-in-cheek grotesquerie of David Lynch. But the fierce inventiveness of Hannah’s prose makes him something sui generis entirely, a writer who renders the project of comparison a farce.

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25 Comments

  1. Kyle Minor

      Thank you for posting this link. I’m happy to read anything by Wells Tower, anything about Barry Hannah, anything in such a magazine as Garden & Gun. How could it be possible there could be a magazine titled Garden & Gun?

  2. Kyle Minor

      Thank you for posting this link. I’m happy to read anything by Wells Tower, anything about Barry Hannah, anything in such a magazine as Garden & Gun. How could it be possible there could be a magazine titled Garden & Gun?

  3. Lincoln

      I think I’m going to drop out of life with Bats Out of Hell in hand.

  4. Lincoln

      I think I’m going to drop out of life with Bats Out of Hell in hand.

  5. Ryan Call

      great link/post justin

  6. Ryan Call

      great link/post justin

  7. Peter Markus

      Lincoln,

      Bats is one of those books I don’t dare finish, because once I do live to finish it it’ll erase most everything left in its wake.

      Thanks to Justin via Sampsell for bringing this article to light.

      Garden & Gun, that’s a joke, right?

  8. Peter Markus

      Lincoln,

      Bats is one of those books I don’t dare finish, because once I do live to finish it it’ll erase most everything left in its wake.

      Thanks to Justin via Sampsell for bringing this article to light.

      Garden & Gun, that’s a joke, right?

  9. pr
  10. Aaron

      stellar post justin. gulf coast excerpted his new novel-in-the-works “Sick Soldier at Your Door” in its winter/spring 09 issue, w/ an interesting q&a too. also, if you can find it, hannah wrote an article about his lushest, most creative and egomaniacle days in tuscalooosa for playboy’s august, 07 issue. i’ve never tracked it down but heard it’s interesting. it’s head and subhead sure is: “No Far No Well: Sure, leaving Las Vegas is hard, but if you’re an award-winning fiction writer and an unrepentant reprobate, leaving Tuscaloosa is a lot harder. Tuscaloosa, 1974-1979.”

  11. Aaron

      stellar post justin. gulf coast excerpted his new novel-in-the-works “Sick Soldier at Your Door” in its winter/spring 09 issue, w/ an interesting q&a too. also, if you can find it, hannah wrote an article about his lushest, most creative and egomaniacle days in tuscalooosa for playboy’s august, 07 issue. i’ve never tracked it down but heard it’s interesting. it’s head and subhead sure is: “No Far No Well: Sure, leaving Las Vegas is hard, but if you’re an award-winning fiction writer and an unrepentant reprobate, leaving Tuscaloosa is a lot harder. Tuscaloosa, 1974-1979.”

  12. Justin Taylor

      Aaron, I did not know either of those things. Thanks a world for the tips. I’m right on ’em & will report back with findings in due time.

  13. Justin Taylor

      Aaron, I did not know either of those things. Thanks a world for the tips. I’m right on ’em & will report back with findings in due time.

  14. Aaron

      you bet justin. just sharing more hannahmania as you have here. hope you like it.

  15. Aaron

      you bet justin. just sharing more hannahmania as you have here. hope you like it.

  16. Aaron

      you know, i have the gulf coast issue here. it’s yours if you want, i can mail it to you.

  17. Aaron

      you know, i have the gulf coast issue here. it’s yours if you want, i can mail it to you.

  18. KevinS

      “Moan around on it some” is such an awesome bit of dialogue.

      I also love the part in this article when Hannah is pissed about the cashier not knowing who Larry Brown is.

  19. KevinS

      “Moan around on it some” is such an awesome bit of dialogue.

      I also love the part in this article when Hannah is pissed about the cashier not knowing who Larry Brown is.

  20. Justin Taylor

      Really? that would be fantastic. I’ll find something suitable to send you back. I’d rather not post my address on the thread. Can you shoot me an email at thebrightfires@gmail.com and we can trade addresses?

  21. Justin Taylor

      Really? that would be fantastic. I’ll find something suitable to send you back. I’d rather not post my address on the thread. Can you shoot me an email at thebrightfires@gmail.com and we can trade addresses?

  22. Justin Taylor

      Yeah, I like that part too. Larry Brown’s interesting… I’ve read his first novel, and both his collections. Sometimes he seems like he’s laying the Southern Charm on a bit thick, but there are some real gems in his work. The title story of Big Bad Love comes right to mind. He’s got about 3 or 4 other novels I haven’t made time for yet, but it pleases me to know they’re out there–waiting.

  23. Justin Taylor

      Yeah, I like that part too. Larry Brown’s interesting… I’ve read his first novel, and both his collections. Sometimes he seems like he’s laying the Southern Charm on a bit thick, but there are some real gems in his work. The title story of Big Bad Love comes right to mind. He’s got about 3 or 4 other novels I haven’t made time for yet, but it pleases me to know they’re out there–waiting.

  24. Ken Baumann

      !!!

      Okay, finally ordering some Hannah.

  25. Ken Baumann

      !!!

      Okay, finally ordering some Hannah.