After highlighting the books I've read set in the fictional South, it seems to follow that I should next review the books I have read that were set in the real South. There are three of them, although the first one, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, I have to confess I read in late 2010, following a trip to Savannah. I will start with that one, however, as it is the best of the three.
A New York journalist moves to Savannah in the 1980s out of a love for the food, the architecture, the Spanish moss, the essence of the city. In the midst of documenting his experiences in this quintessentially Southern city, murder, intrigue, and scandal erupt. The result is one of the best stories, and best books, I have read, possibly ever. In my experience it is relatively rare for a non-fiction to read like a novel, but this book does. John Berendt brings to life not only the major players in his story, but virtually every person he encounters. One of my personal favorites is the woman he overhears excitedly describing the bloodlines of her soon-to-be...daughter-in-law. And if, "a good time, not yet had by all" is not one of the best lines in modern literature, I don't know what is. The cherry on top is that Berendt beautifully brings to life the city of Savannah: his descriptions of the city are true to life; turning the pages, one can almost hear the rustle of live oak leaves and Spanish moss as a soft sea breeze slips through the squares.
If Midnight in the Garden... is the micro-version of the South, Dominion of Memories: Jefferson, Madison, & the Decline of Virginia is the macro-version. Focused largely on the early nineteenth century, this book sets the stage for the American Civil War. Laying open the vast difference of opinion on the extent of state's rights even among the founding father's, one has the feeling while reading this that such bloody conflict had been inevitable for at least two generations. Further, reading of the state of Virginia's railways and roads (often impassable even to the best addresses), one sees the futility of the Southern cause: clearly, clearly, no army could move efficiently through this state, saddled as it was with unmatched railroads, muddy, rutted "roads" and a white population essentially at war with itself. (Not only in the traditional brother-against-brother sense of the Civil War: in Virginia, wealthy aristocrats from the Tidewater area had resisted so much as giving the vote to less wealthy whites from present-day West Virginia; the latter successfully created their own state in the midst of the Civil War after contemplating as much for decades.) In the end, I came away with the sense that the founding fathers were united only against the British, therefore, setting up a fledgling nation for inevitable internecine conflict.
The Plantation Mistress covers a similar time and place: the ante-bellum South of the early- to mid-1800s. This past spring Ben and I had the opportunity to visit two plantations just outside of Charleston, one of which was celebrating Women's History Month (March) by highlighting the role and work of the plantation mistress. To learn more, they recommended reading this book, in which one learns that, contrary to being Scarlett O'Hara, the overwhelming, vast majority of Southern women wished to be Scarlett. Make no mistake, there were wonderfully wealthy women in the Old South who sat on their porch drinking mint juleps and gossiping the afternoon away. Most women, however, were more likely to be found nursing a sick child or up to the elbows in pickling brine or checking the cellar stores or, or, or. Where a woman would not be found, however, is basically anywhere other than home: travel for women was greatly restricted, to the extent that many describe feeling trapped, especially when the husband was traveling and the children (if there were any) were away at school. In those cases, the plantation mistress, often far removed from her family and sometimes as young as 16 or 17, might be the only white woman for miles around, leaving her in state of utter isolation. The result of this isolation is a treasure trove of personal letters to husbands, mothers, sisters, and friends; this book is all the richer for the generous portions of these letters that pepper the pages.
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