Short Takes

The Chronicle of Higher Education reviews THE HORRIBLE GIFT OF FREEDOM: "In this highly original study, Wood offers no easy answers; his scrutiny of popular and artistic imagery shows us clearly how abolition, slavery, and collective memory collide. As long as we, former slave-trading cultures, celebrate abolition in order to forget slavery, the past will continue to haunt us."

Paste Magazine calls SERIOUSLY FUNNY a "literate, eccentric collection": "Hamby and Kirby, significant poets in their own right, have done important work here. They throw rescue lines to readers who jumped that very serious ship of verse, the HMS T.S. Eliot, way back when."

The most recent issue of the Alabama Review includes reviews of Andrew Warnes's SAVAGE BARBECUE ("an important contribution to the body of literature on food culture") and Scott Stephan's REDEEMING THE SOUTHERN FAMILY ("This thoroughly researched and well-written book provides insightful analysis of the role women played in the spread of evangelicalism throughout the south.")

The new Nineteenth Century French Studies reviews our recent paperback edition of Edward Kaplan's BAUDELAIRE'S PROSE POEMS: "If his book of critical essays on Baudelaire's prose poems deserves to be looked at with fresh eyes now, twenty years after its initial publication, it's partly because it stands the test of time. But it's also because, in my estimation, when first published, it was in some ways ahead of its times and can be even better appreciated today."

Upcoming events:
Saturday, June 5 -- Knoxville, TN
Fred Sauceman and CORNBREAD NATION 5 will be featured at the International Biscuit Festival in Knoxville, a celebration connected with the Market Square Farmer's Market. There will also be biscuit songs, biscuit art, and, of course, a biscuit bake-off.