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Page 1: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 133

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 233

Contents

983089983106983145983140983140983148983141983138983137983157983149 983107983151983159983148983141983161983122983141 983141983142983161 983078 983123983159983145983142983156 983116983116983120

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983094983089 983106983157983154983156 983107983151983138983148983141 983107983137983156983149983137 983150

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983120983151983155983156983139983137983154 983140983155 983156983151 983112983145983149 983155983141983148983142 983142983154983151983149 983137983108983145983150983141983154 983145983150 983127983145983150983141983155983138983157983154983143 983113983150983140983145983137983150983137

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983095983096 983107983151983150983155983156983137983150983139983141 983112 983127983151983151983156983145 983150

983096983093 983108983141983137983154 983107983148 983137983155983155 983151983142 983090983088983089983089

983096983095 983127983137 983148983156 ldquo983112983141983148983152983141983154rdquo 983126983151983148983156 983162

983097983093 983110983154 983137983150983139983141983155 983120983137983154 983147983141983154

983097983095 983109983149983149 983137983148 983141983150983141rsquo983155 983106983137983147983141983154983161 983137983150 983140 983106983137983145983156 983123983144983151983152

983089983088983089 983112983151983159983137983154983140 983111983137983154983142983145983141983148983140 983106983137983148983148983137983140983141983141983154

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983089983091983090 ldquo983117983137 983150983139983144983145983148983140rdquo 983117983151983154983154 983145983155983151983150

983124983144983141 983106983141983155983156 983124983144 983137983156 983105983148983149983151983155983156 983127983137983155

983089983091983097 983107983137983154983151983148 983107983148983137983161

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983089983095983091 983113983150983155983152983141983139983156983151983154 983092

983089983096983089 983108983137983154983147 983123983156983137983154983155

983089983096983092 983107983148983161983140983141

983089983096983097 983123983144983141 983108983154983145 983150983147983155 983124983151983151 983117983157983139983144 983151983142 983113983156

983089983097983092 983122 983137983150983140983161 983123983156983141983141983152983148983141

983089983097983097 Acknowledgments by Marny Vanderroost

983090983088983091 Credits

983090983088983093 Reading Group Guide

983090983089983089 List of Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983089

B983145983140983140983148983141983138983137983157983149 C983151983159983148983141983161 R983141983141983142983161 amp S983159983145983142983156 983148983148983152

W983145983150983141983155983138983157983154983143 O983144983145983151 983092983092983094983097983088

CEASE AND DESIST DEMAND

Pursuant to Title 983089983095 of the United States Code

City Manager

983089983091 Spalding Street

Winesburg Indiana 983092983094983095983089983090

Dear Sir or Madam

is law firm represents the Town of Winesburg (Ohio) If you

are represented by legal counsel please direct this leer to your

aorney immediately and have your aorney notify us of such

representation

It has been brought to our aention that your town Winesburg

(Indiana) has been using the Winesburg trademark in association

with the marketing or sale of your products and services namely

those of meditative introspection synthetic emotional effects

general literary malaise and cathartic artistic performances in-

cluding but not limited to confessions covetings secrets-keeping

and the wholesale packaging and propagation of spent signature

tears It is possible that you were unaware of this conflict so we

believe that it is in our mutual interest to bring this maer to your

aention

Winesburg is a registered trademark of our municipality Wines- burg (Ohio) and is used in conjunction with the distribution of

dramatic monologues and third-person narrations to invoke the

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090

grotesque and map the psychophysiological and neurotic manifes-

tations of its inhabitants in order to derive empathic and epiphanic

pleasure andor pain in a controlled hermetic seing Winesburgrsquosfederal trademark registration has been in full effect for over nine-

ty (1048633983088) years since shortly aer the publication of the book of

short stories Winesburg Ohio by Mr Sherwood Anderson at

Winesburg Ohio refers to a fictional town of Mr Andersonrsquos own

imagination modeled on the town of Clyde Ohio whose mali-

cious libel litigation with the estate of Mr Anderson continues to

this day e trademarked village of Winesburg (Ohio) was con-

structed in 9830891048633983090983088 in southwestern Paint Township of Holt County

by Austrian Mesmerists fleeing the dissolution of the Austro-Hun-

garian Empire aficionados of the book Winesburg Ohio and early

practitioners and adherents of applied phrenology and Gestalt

therapies A copy of the federal trademark registration is aached

for your reference as Exhibit A

Our federal registration of this trademark provides us with certain

proprietary rights is includes the right to restrict the use of the

trademark or a confusingly similar trademark in association with

confusingly similar products or services such as the distribution

of Sadness Fear Longing and Confusion itself We have patented

Madness We own Trembling We extensively market Grief We

facilitate the Recovery of Emotionally Paralyzing Memories and

the Reliving of Childhood Trauma We distribute Dirges and pro-

vide for all manner of Despairing Confession and Ecstatic Revela-

tion in this aesthetically framed and fictive community situated

on a glacial declivity near the second-largest Amish selement

in the United States e Lanham Act (the US Trademark Act)also provides numerous remedies for trademark infringement and

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983091

dilution including but not limited to preliminary and permanent

injunctive relief money damages a defendantrsquos profits provisions

for the destruction or confiscation of infringing products and pro-motional materials and where intentional infringement is shown

(as would be the case here) aorneysrsquo fees and possible treble

money damages

It is urgent that we exercise our right to protect our trademark It

serves as an important and distinctive representation of the origin

of our products State and federal law supports our position thatconfusingly similar trademarks may cause confusion among cus-

tomers is confusion may cause substantial harm to the trade-

mark by facilitating the loss of its effectiveness in establishing a

distinct association between it our products and services and

the townrsquos goodwill

Due to these concerns and because unauthorized use of our fed-erally registered trademark amounts to an infringement of our

trademark rights we respectively request that you cease and desist

from any further use of the Winesburg trademark in association

with the sale marketing distribution promotion or other iden-

tification of your products or services

is leer is sent without prejudice to Winesburg (Ohio)rsquos rightsand claims all of which are expressly reserved In addition to this

certified mail return receipt requested version I am also sending

you a copy of this leer by regular first-class mail in case you refuse

to accept the certified mail version of this leer

Please respond by leer indicating your intention to cease and de-

sist from the use of the Winesburg trademark or any confusinglysimilar trademark within ten (983089983088) calendar days

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983092

We hope that this issue may be resolved this way so we can avoid

any further legal remedies as provided by state law and under fed-

eral law pursuant to the Lanham Act

Sincerely

Avery Nuit Esq

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983093

e town of Winesburg operates under the weak-mayor system al- ways has I am the city manager a creature of the council charged

by the council five elected members to keep the trash trucks run-

ning on time ere arenrsquot too many other municipal services to

aend to e fire department is volunteer e county provides

the police ere are the sewers of the town and I maintain them

myself and conduct the daily public tours e sewers of Wines-

burg are vast channeling one branch of the Fork River through

underground chambers and pools roofed with vaulted ceilings

tiled with ceramic-faced bricks Te sewers were the last public

works project of the Wabash and Erie Canal before the canal bank-

rupted the state of Indiana I mentioned tours but there arenrsquot that

many tourists interested in sewers I walk the tunnels alone my

footsteps on the paving stones echoing e drip drip drip of the

seeping water Te rapid splashing over the riprap Tere is the

landfill as well to manage the heart-shaped hole where the fossil-

rife limestone of the sewers was quarried punched in the table-

flat topography of a field north of Winesburg We are located on

the drained sandy bed of an ancient inland sea Sea birds from

the Great Lakes find their way to the pit circle and dive down below the rim emerging with beaks stuffed with human hair for

City Manager

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983094

their nests I guess Indiana has complicated laws concerning the

disposal of cut hair Much of the state transships its hair here A

thriving coage industry persists that of locket making using thespent anonymous hair to simulate the locks of a departed loved

one e lockets are aerthoughts fictional keepsakes e locket

makers can be seen rummaging through the rubbish of the dump

collecting bags of damp felt Winesburg was the first city in the

country to install the emergency 1048633983089983089 telephone number J Edward

Roush member of the House of Representatives was our con-

gressman and was instrumental in establishing the system I man-

age that too taking a shi at night usually in the old switching

room to answer the calls of the citizens of Winesburg who more

oen than not do have something emerging Usually not an acute

emergency but more a chronic unrest An anxiousness Not a heart

aack but a heartache I listen Te switches responding to the

impulse of someone somewhere dialing tsk and sigh and click Imanage I am the city manager

bull bull bull

I am not sure what to do with the cease and desist order I duly

received from the town of Winesburg Ohio I am not sure I under-stand how to cease and desist the steeping municipal sadness here

It is not as if I or anyone here can help it Years ago Fort Wayne

the statersquos second-largest city twenty miles to the east decided to

exhume its dead and to become like San Francisco free of cem-

eteries and graveyards Te consequence of the decision meant

transporting remains to multiple necropoli on the outskirts of Winesburg e newly dead still arrive daily carried by a special

midnight-blue fleet of North American Van Lines tractor-trailers

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 2: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 233

Contents

983089983106983145983140983140983148983141983138983137983157983149 983107983151983159983148983141983161983122983141 983141983142983161 983078 983123983159983145983142983156 983116983116983120

983093 983107983145983156983161 983117983137 983150983137983143983141983154

983096 983105983149 983137983150 983140983137 983120983137983156983139983144

983089983089 983107983148983141983137 983150983145983150983143 983116983137983140983161 983156983151 983156983144983141 983123983156983137983154983155

983089983095 983114983137983139983147983145983141 983120983137983156983139983144

983090983090 983114983157983148983145983141 983120983137983156983139983144

983090983094 983108983137983148983141 983122983157983149983155983141983161

983090983097 983116983145983149983138983141983154983148983151983155983156

983091983096 983122983137983161983149983151983150983140 983123983150983151983159

983092983090 983115983141983150 983151983142 983119983156983156983157983149 983159983137

983092983095 983117983145983155983155 983111983148983137983140983161983155

983093983091 983124983144983141 983120983154983151983139983141983155983155983141983140 983107983144983141983141 983155983141 983120983154983151983140983157983139983156 983117983137 983150

983094983089 983106983157983154983156 983107983151983138983148983141 983107983137983156983149983137 983150

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 333

983094983093 983124983137983154983137 983114983141983150983147983145983150983155

983095983089 983114983137983139983153983157 983141983155 983108983141983154 983154 983145983140983137 983127 983154 983145983156983141983155

983120983151983155983156983139983137983154 983140983155 983156983151 983112983145983149 983155983141983148983142 983142983154983151983149 983137983108983145983150983141983154 983145983150 983127983145983150983141983155983138983157983154983143 983113983150983140983145983137983150983137

983095983092 983120983141983156983141 983127983137983155983156983141 983116983137 983138 983124983141983139983144983150983145983139983145983137983150

983095983096 983107983151983150983155983156983137983150983139983141 983112 983127983151983151983156983145 983150

983096983093 983108983141983137983154 983107983148 983137983155983155 983151983142 983090983088983089983089

983096983095 983127983137 983148983156 ldquo983112983141983148983152983141983154rdquo 983126983151983148983156 983162

983097983093 983110983154 983137983150983139983141983155 983120983137983154 983147983141983154

983097983095 983109983149983149 983137983148 983141983150983141rsquo983155 983106983137983147983141983154983161 983137983150 983140 983106983137983145983156 983123983144983151983152

983089983088983089 983112983151983159983137983154983140 983111983137983154983142983145983141983148983140 983106983137983148983148983137983140983141983141983154

983089983088983096 983106983141983137983157 983117983151983154983154983151983159

983089983089983091 983110983151983157983150983140 983145 983150 983156983144983141 983120983148983137983139983141983138983151 983124983144983141 983129 983141983137 983154983138983151983151983147983151983142 983109983149983145983148983141 983108983157983154 983147983144983141 983145983149 983112983145983143983144 983123983139983144983151983151983148

983089983089983095 983124983144983141 983106983151983156983156983148983141

983089983090983091 983108983141983137983150983150983141 983123983156983151983158983141983154983155

983089983090983095 983111983154983141983143983143 983120983145983156983149983137983150

983089983090983097 983117983137 983154983145 983127983137983145983156983145983150983143

983089983091983090 ldquo983117983137 983150983139983144983145983148983140rdquo 983117983151983154983154 983145983155983151983150

983124983144983141 983106983141983155983156 983124983144 983137983156 983105983148983149983151983155983156 983127983137983155

983089983091983097 983107983137983154983151983148 983107983148983137983161

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983089983092983090 983124983154983145983152983148983141 983107983154983151983159983150

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983089983095983091 983113983150983155983152983141983139983156983151983154 983092

983089983096983089 983108983137983154983147 983123983156983137983154983155

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983089983097983092 983122 983137983150983140983161 983123983156983141983141983152983148983141

983089983097983097 Acknowledgments by Marny Vanderroost

983090983088983091 Credits

983090983088983093 Reading Group Guide

983090983089983089 List of Contributors

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B983145983140983140983148983141983138983137983157983149 C983151983159983148983141983161 R983141983141983142983161 amp S983159983145983142983156 983148983148983152

W983145983150983141983155983138983157983154983143 O983144983145983151 983092983092983094983097983088

CEASE AND DESIST DEMAND

Pursuant to Title 983089983095 of the United States Code

City Manager

983089983091 Spalding Street

Winesburg Indiana 983092983094983095983089983090

Dear Sir or Madam

is law firm represents the Town of Winesburg (Ohio) If you

are represented by legal counsel please direct this leer to your

aorney immediately and have your aorney notify us of such

representation

It has been brought to our aention that your town Winesburg

(Indiana) has been using the Winesburg trademark in association

with the marketing or sale of your products and services namely

those of meditative introspection synthetic emotional effects

general literary malaise and cathartic artistic performances in-

cluding but not limited to confessions covetings secrets-keeping

and the wholesale packaging and propagation of spent signature

tears It is possible that you were unaware of this conflict so we

believe that it is in our mutual interest to bring this maer to your

aention

Winesburg is a registered trademark of our municipality Wines- burg (Ohio) and is used in conjunction with the distribution of

dramatic monologues and third-person narrations to invoke the

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983090

grotesque and map the psychophysiological and neurotic manifes-

tations of its inhabitants in order to derive empathic and epiphanic

pleasure andor pain in a controlled hermetic seing Winesburgrsquosfederal trademark registration has been in full effect for over nine-

ty (1048633983088) years since shortly aer the publication of the book of

short stories Winesburg Ohio by Mr Sherwood Anderson at

Winesburg Ohio refers to a fictional town of Mr Andersonrsquos own

imagination modeled on the town of Clyde Ohio whose mali-

cious libel litigation with the estate of Mr Anderson continues to

this day e trademarked village of Winesburg (Ohio) was con-

structed in 9830891048633983090983088 in southwestern Paint Township of Holt County

by Austrian Mesmerists fleeing the dissolution of the Austro-Hun-

garian Empire aficionados of the book Winesburg Ohio and early

practitioners and adherents of applied phrenology and Gestalt

therapies A copy of the federal trademark registration is aached

for your reference as Exhibit A

Our federal registration of this trademark provides us with certain

proprietary rights is includes the right to restrict the use of the

trademark or a confusingly similar trademark in association with

confusingly similar products or services such as the distribution

of Sadness Fear Longing and Confusion itself We have patented

Madness We own Trembling We extensively market Grief We

facilitate the Recovery of Emotionally Paralyzing Memories and

the Reliving of Childhood Trauma We distribute Dirges and pro-

vide for all manner of Despairing Confession and Ecstatic Revela-

tion in this aesthetically framed and fictive community situated

on a glacial declivity near the second-largest Amish selement

in the United States e Lanham Act (the US Trademark Act)also provides numerous remedies for trademark infringement and

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983091

dilution including but not limited to preliminary and permanent

injunctive relief money damages a defendantrsquos profits provisions

for the destruction or confiscation of infringing products and pro-motional materials and where intentional infringement is shown

(as would be the case here) aorneysrsquo fees and possible treble

money damages

It is urgent that we exercise our right to protect our trademark It

serves as an important and distinctive representation of the origin

of our products State and federal law supports our position thatconfusingly similar trademarks may cause confusion among cus-

tomers is confusion may cause substantial harm to the trade-

mark by facilitating the loss of its effectiveness in establishing a

distinct association between it our products and services and

the townrsquos goodwill

Due to these concerns and because unauthorized use of our fed-erally registered trademark amounts to an infringement of our

trademark rights we respectively request that you cease and desist

from any further use of the Winesburg trademark in association

with the sale marketing distribution promotion or other iden-

tification of your products or services

is leer is sent without prejudice to Winesburg (Ohio)rsquos rightsand claims all of which are expressly reserved In addition to this

certified mail return receipt requested version I am also sending

you a copy of this leer by regular first-class mail in case you refuse

to accept the certified mail version of this leer

Please respond by leer indicating your intention to cease and de-

sist from the use of the Winesburg trademark or any confusinglysimilar trademark within ten (983089983088) calendar days

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983092

We hope that this issue may be resolved this way so we can avoid

any further legal remedies as provided by state law and under fed-

eral law pursuant to the Lanham Act

Sincerely

Avery Nuit Esq

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983093

e town of Winesburg operates under the weak-mayor system al- ways has I am the city manager a creature of the council charged

by the council five elected members to keep the trash trucks run-

ning on time ere arenrsquot too many other municipal services to

aend to e fire department is volunteer e county provides

the police ere are the sewers of the town and I maintain them

myself and conduct the daily public tours e sewers of Wines-

burg are vast channeling one branch of the Fork River through

underground chambers and pools roofed with vaulted ceilings

tiled with ceramic-faced bricks Te sewers were the last public

works project of the Wabash and Erie Canal before the canal bank-

rupted the state of Indiana I mentioned tours but there arenrsquot that

many tourists interested in sewers I walk the tunnels alone my

footsteps on the paving stones echoing e drip drip drip of the

seeping water Te rapid splashing over the riprap Tere is the

landfill as well to manage the heart-shaped hole where the fossil-

rife limestone of the sewers was quarried punched in the table-

flat topography of a field north of Winesburg We are located on

the drained sandy bed of an ancient inland sea Sea birds from

the Great Lakes find their way to the pit circle and dive down below the rim emerging with beaks stuffed with human hair for

City Manager

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983094

their nests I guess Indiana has complicated laws concerning the

disposal of cut hair Much of the state transships its hair here A

thriving coage industry persists that of locket making using thespent anonymous hair to simulate the locks of a departed loved

one e lockets are aerthoughts fictional keepsakes e locket

makers can be seen rummaging through the rubbish of the dump

collecting bags of damp felt Winesburg was the first city in the

country to install the emergency 1048633983089983089 telephone number J Edward

Roush member of the House of Representatives was our con-

gressman and was instrumental in establishing the system I man-

age that too taking a shi at night usually in the old switching

room to answer the calls of the citizens of Winesburg who more

oen than not do have something emerging Usually not an acute

emergency but more a chronic unrest An anxiousness Not a heart

aack but a heartache I listen Te switches responding to the

impulse of someone somewhere dialing tsk and sigh and click Imanage I am the city manager

bull bull bull

I am not sure what to do with the cease and desist order I duly

received from the town of Winesburg Ohio I am not sure I under-stand how to cease and desist the steeping municipal sadness here

It is not as if I or anyone here can help it Years ago Fort Wayne

the statersquos second-largest city twenty miles to the east decided to

exhume its dead and to become like San Francisco free of cem-

eteries and graveyards Te consequence of the decision meant

transporting remains to multiple necropoli on the outskirts of Winesburg e newly dead still arrive daily carried by a special

midnight-blue fleet of North American Van Lines tractor-trailers

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 3: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 333

983094983093 983124983137983154983137 983114983141983150983147983145983150983155

983095983089 983114983137983139983153983157 983141983155 983108983141983154 983154 983145983140983137 983127 983154 983145983156983141983155

983120983151983155983156983139983137983154 983140983155 983156983151 983112983145983149 983155983141983148983142 983142983154983151983149 983137983108983145983150983141983154 983145983150 983127983145983150983141983155983138983157983154983143 983113983150983140983145983137983150983137

983095983092 983120983141983156983141 983127983137983155983156983141 983116983137 983138 983124983141983139983144983150983145983139983145983137983150

983095983096 983107983151983150983155983156983137983150983139983141 983112 983127983151983151983156983145 983150

983096983093 983108983141983137983154 983107983148 983137983155983155 983151983142 983090983088983089983089

983096983095 983127983137 983148983156 ldquo983112983141983148983152983141983154rdquo 983126983151983148983156 983162

983097983093 983110983154 983137983150983139983141983155 983120983137983154 983147983141983154

983097983095 983109983149983149 983137983148 983141983150983141rsquo983155 983106983137983147983141983154983161 983137983150 983140 983106983137983145983156 983123983144983151983152

983089983088983089 983112983151983159983137983154983140 983111983137983154983142983145983141983148983140 983106983137983148983148983137983140983141983141983154

983089983088983096 983106983141983137983157 983117983151983154983154983151983159

983089983089983091 983110983151983157983150983140 983145 983150 983156983144983141 983120983148983137983139983141983138983151 983124983144983141 983129 983141983137 983154983138983151983151983147983151983142 983109983149983145983148983141 983108983157983154 983147983144983141 983145983149 983112983145983143983144 983123983139983144983151983151983148

983089983089983095 983124983144983141 983106983151983156983156983148983141

983089983090983091 983108983141983137983150983150983141 983123983156983151983158983141983154983155

983089983090983095 983111983154983141983143983143 983120983145983156983149983137983150

983089983090983097 983117983137 983154983145 983127983137983145983156983145983150983143

983089983091983090 ldquo983117983137 983150983139983144983145983148983140rdquo 983117983151983154983154 983145983155983151983150

983124983144983141 983106983141983155983156 983124983144 983137983156 983105983148983149983151983155983156 983127983137983155

983089983091983097 983107983137983154983151983148 983107983148983137983161

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 433

983089983092983090 983124983154983145983152983148983141 983107983154983151983159983150

983089983092983097 983111983154983157983140983143983141 983127983154983145983143983144983156

983089983093983091 983119983139983139983157983152983161 983127983145983150983141983155983138983157983154983143

983089983094983089 983124983144983141 983107983137983150983156983151983154 983121983157983137983140983154983157983152983148983141983156983155

983089983094983091 983122983141 983158983141983154 983141983150983140 983108983137983158983141

983089983095983089 983120983154983151983142983141983155983155983151983154 983112983141983148983141983150 983107 983105983150983140983141983154 983155983141983150

983089983095983091 983113983150983155983152983141983139983156983151983154 983092

983089983096983089 983108983137983154983147 983123983156983137983154983155

983089983096983092 983107983148983161983140983141

983089983096983097 983123983144983141 983108983154983145 983150983147983155 983124983151983151 983117983157983139983144 983151983142 983113983156

983089983097983092 983122 983137983150983140983161 983123983156983141983141983152983148983141

983089983097983097 Acknowledgments by Marny Vanderroost

983090983088983091 Credits

983090983088983093 Reading Group Guide

983090983089983089 List of Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 533

983089

B983145983140983140983148983141983138983137983157983149 C983151983159983148983141983161 R983141983141983142983161 amp S983159983145983142983156 983148983148983152

W983145983150983141983155983138983157983154983143 O983144983145983151 983092983092983094983097983088

CEASE AND DESIST DEMAND

Pursuant to Title 983089983095 of the United States Code

City Manager

983089983091 Spalding Street

Winesburg Indiana 983092983094983095983089983090

Dear Sir or Madam

is law firm represents the Town of Winesburg (Ohio) If you

are represented by legal counsel please direct this leer to your

aorney immediately and have your aorney notify us of such

representation

It has been brought to our aention that your town Winesburg

(Indiana) has been using the Winesburg trademark in association

with the marketing or sale of your products and services namely

those of meditative introspection synthetic emotional effects

general literary malaise and cathartic artistic performances in-

cluding but not limited to confessions covetings secrets-keeping

and the wholesale packaging and propagation of spent signature

tears It is possible that you were unaware of this conflict so we

believe that it is in our mutual interest to bring this maer to your

aention

Winesburg is a registered trademark of our municipality Wines- burg (Ohio) and is used in conjunction with the distribution of

dramatic monologues and third-person narrations to invoke the

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 633

983090

grotesque and map the psychophysiological and neurotic manifes-

tations of its inhabitants in order to derive empathic and epiphanic

pleasure andor pain in a controlled hermetic seing Winesburgrsquosfederal trademark registration has been in full effect for over nine-

ty (1048633983088) years since shortly aer the publication of the book of

short stories Winesburg Ohio by Mr Sherwood Anderson at

Winesburg Ohio refers to a fictional town of Mr Andersonrsquos own

imagination modeled on the town of Clyde Ohio whose mali-

cious libel litigation with the estate of Mr Anderson continues to

this day e trademarked village of Winesburg (Ohio) was con-

structed in 9830891048633983090983088 in southwestern Paint Township of Holt County

by Austrian Mesmerists fleeing the dissolution of the Austro-Hun-

garian Empire aficionados of the book Winesburg Ohio and early

practitioners and adherents of applied phrenology and Gestalt

therapies A copy of the federal trademark registration is aached

for your reference as Exhibit A

Our federal registration of this trademark provides us with certain

proprietary rights is includes the right to restrict the use of the

trademark or a confusingly similar trademark in association with

confusingly similar products or services such as the distribution

of Sadness Fear Longing and Confusion itself We have patented

Madness We own Trembling We extensively market Grief We

facilitate the Recovery of Emotionally Paralyzing Memories and

the Reliving of Childhood Trauma We distribute Dirges and pro-

vide for all manner of Despairing Confession and Ecstatic Revela-

tion in this aesthetically framed and fictive community situated

on a glacial declivity near the second-largest Amish selement

in the United States e Lanham Act (the US Trademark Act)also provides numerous remedies for trademark infringement and

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 733

983091

dilution including but not limited to preliminary and permanent

injunctive relief money damages a defendantrsquos profits provisions

for the destruction or confiscation of infringing products and pro-motional materials and where intentional infringement is shown

(as would be the case here) aorneysrsquo fees and possible treble

money damages

It is urgent that we exercise our right to protect our trademark It

serves as an important and distinctive representation of the origin

of our products State and federal law supports our position thatconfusingly similar trademarks may cause confusion among cus-

tomers is confusion may cause substantial harm to the trade-

mark by facilitating the loss of its effectiveness in establishing a

distinct association between it our products and services and

the townrsquos goodwill

Due to these concerns and because unauthorized use of our fed-erally registered trademark amounts to an infringement of our

trademark rights we respectively request that you cease and desist

from any further use of the Winesburg trademark in association

with the sale marketing distribution promotion or other iden-

tification of your products or services

is leer is sent without prejudice to Winesburg (Ohio)rsquos rightsand claims all of which are expressly reserved In addition to this

certified mail return receipt requested version I am also sending

you a copy of this leer by regular first-class mail in case you refuse

to accept the certified mail version of this leer

Please respond by leer indicating your intention to cease and de-

sist from the use of the Winesburg trademark or any confusinglysimilar trademark within ten (983089983088) calendar days

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983092

We hope that this issue may be resolved this way so we can avoid

any further legal remedies as provided by state law and under fed-

eral law pursuant to the Lanham Act

Sincerely

Avery Nuit Esq

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983093

e town of Winesburg operates under the weak-mayor system al- ways has I am the city manager a creature of the council charged

by the council five elected members to keep the trash trucks run-

ning on time ere arenrsquot too many other municipal services to

aend to e fire department is volunteer e county provides

the police ere are the sewers of the town and I maintain them

myself and conduct the daily public tours e sewers of Wines-

burg are vast channeling one branch of the Fork River through

underground chambers and pools roofed with vaulted ceilings

tiled with ceramic-faced bricks Te sewers were the last public

works project of the Wabash and Erie Canal before the canal bank-

rupted the state of Indiana I mentioned tours but there arenrsquot that

many tourists interested in sewers I walk the tunnels alone my

footsteps on the paving stones echoing e drip drip drip of the

seeping water Te rapid splashing over the riprap Tere is the

landfill as well to manage the heart-shaped hole where the fossil-

rife limestone of the sewers was quarried punched in the table-

flat topography of a field north of Winesburg We are located on

the drained sandy bed of an ancient inland sea Sea birds from

the Great Lakes find their way to the pit circle and dive down below the rim emerging with beaks stuffed with human hair for

City Manager

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983094

their nests I guess Indiana has complicated laws concerning the

disposal of cut hair Much of the state transships its hair here A

thriving coage industry persists that of locket making using thespent anonymous hair to simulate the locks of a departed loved

one e lockets are aerthoughts fictional keepsakes e locket

makers can be seen rummaging through the rubbish of the dump

collecting bags of damp felt Winesburg was the first city in the

country to install the emergency 1048633983089983089 telephone number J Edward

Roush member of the House of Representatives was our con-

gressman and was instrumental in establishing the system I man-

age that too taking a shi at night usually in the old switching

room to answer the calls of the citizens of Winesburg who more

oen than not do have something emerging Usually not an acute

emergency but more a chronic unrest An anxiousness Not a heart

aack but a heartache I listen Te switches responding to the

impulse of someone somewhere dialing tsk and sigh and click Imanage I am the city manager

bull bull bull

I am not sure what to do with the cease and desist order I duly

received from the town of Winesburg Ohio I am not sure I under-stand how to cease and desist the steeping municipal sadness here

It is not as if I or anyone here can help it Years ago Fort Wayne

the statersquos second-largest city twenty miles to the east decided to

exhume its dead and to become like San Francisco free of cem-

eteries and graveyards Te consequence of the decision meant

transporting remains to multiple necropoli on the outskirts of Winesburg e newly dead still arrive daily carried by a special

midnight-blue fleet of North American Van Lines tractor-trailers

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

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ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 4: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

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983089983092983097 983111983154983157983140983143983141 983127983154983145983143983144983156

983089983093983091 983119983139983139983157983152983161 983127983145983150983141983155983138983157983154983143

983089983094983089 983124983144983141 983107983137983150983156983151983154 983121983157983137983140983154983157983152983148983141983156983155

983089983094983091 983122983141 983158983141983154 983141983150983140 983108983137983158983141

983089983095983089 983120983154983151983142983141983155983155983151983154 983112983141983148983141983150 983107 983105983150983140983141983154 983155983141983150

983089983095983091 983113983150983155983152983141983139983156983151983154 983092

983089983096983089 983108983137983154983147 983123983156983137983154983155

983089983096983092 983107983148983161983140983141

983089983096983097 983123983144983141 983108983154983145 983150983147983155 983124983151983151 983117983157983139983144 983151983142 983113983156

983089983097983092 983122 983137983150983140983161 983123983156983141983141983152983148983141

983089983097983097 Acknowledgments by Marny Vanderroost

983090983088983091 Credits

983090983088983093 Reading Group Guide

983090983089983089 List of Contributors

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983089

B983145983140983140983148983141983138983137983157983149 C983151983159983148983141983161 R983141983141983142983161 amp S983159983145983142983156 983148983148983152

W983145983150983141983155983138983157983154983143 O983144983145983151 983092983092983094983097983088

CEASE AND DESIST DEMAND

Pursuant to Title 983089983095 of the United States Code

City Manager

983089983091 Spalding Street

Winesburg Indiana 983092983094983095983089983090

Dear Sir or Madam

is law firm represents the Town of Winesburg (Ohio) If you

are represented by legal counsel please direct this leer to your

aorney immediately and have your aorney notify us of such

representation

It has been brought to our aention that your town Winesburg

(Indiana) has been using the Winesburg trademark in association

with the marketing or sale of your products and services namely

those of meditative introspection synthetic emotional effects

general literary malaise and cathartic artistic performances in-

cluding but not limited to confessions covetings secrets-keeping

and the wholesale packaging and propagation of spent signature

tears It is possible that you were unaware of this conflict so we

believe that it is in our mutual interest to bring this maer to your

aention

Winesburg is a registered trademark of our municipality Wines- burg (Ohio) and is used in conjunction with the distribution of

dramatic monologues and third-person narrations to invoke the

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983090

grotesque and map the psychophysiological and neurotic manifes-

tations of its inhabitants in order to derive empathic and epiphanic

pleasure andor pain in a controlled hermetic seing Winesburgrsquosfederal trademark registration has been in full effect for over nine-

ty (1048633983088) years since shortly aer the publication of the book of

short stories Winesburg Ohio by Mr Sherwood Anderson at

Winesburg Ohio refers to a fictional town of Mr Andersonrsquos own

imagination modeled on the town of Clyde Ohio whose mali-

cious libel litigation with the estate of Mr Anderson continues to

this day e trademarked village of Winesburg (Ohio) was con-

structed in 9830891048633983090983088 in southwestern Paint Township of Holt County

by Austrian Mesmerists fleeing the dissolution of the Austro-Hun-

garian Empire aficionados of the book Winesburg Ohio and early

practitioners and adherents of applied phrenology and Gestalt

therapies A copy of the federal trademark registration is aached

for your reference as Exhibit A

Our federal registration of this trademark provides us with certain

proprietary rights is includes the right to restrict the use of the

trademark or a confusingly similar trademark in association with

confusingly similar products or services such as the distribution

of Sadness Fear Longing and Confusion itself We have patented

Madness We own Trembling We extensively market Grief We

facilitate the Recovery of Emotionally Paralyzing Memories and

the Reliving of Childhood Trauma We distribute Dirges and pro-

vide for all manner of Despairing Confession and Ecstatic Revela-

tion in this aesthetically framed and fictive community situated

on a glacial declivity near the second-largest Amish selement

in the United States e Lanham Act (the US Trademark Act)also provides numerous remedies for trademark infringement and

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983091

dilution including but not limited to preliminary and permanent

injunctive relief money damages a defendantrsquos profits provisions

for the destruction or confiscation of infringing products and pro-motional materials and where intentional infringement is shown

(as would be the case here) aorneysrsquo fees and possible treble

money damages

It is urgent that we exercise our right to protect our trademark It

serves as an important and distinctive representation of the origin

of our products State and federal law supports our position thatconfusingly similar trademarks may cause confusion among cus-

tomers is confusion may cause substantial harm to the trade-

mark by facilitating the loss of its effectiveness in establishing a

distinct association between it our products and services and

the townrsquos goodwill

Due to these concerns and because unauthorized use of our fed-erally registered trademark amounts to an infringement of our

trademark rights we respectively request that you cease and desist

from any further use of the Winesburg trademark in association

with the sale marketing distribution promotion or other iden-

tification of your products or services

is leer is sent without prejudice to Winesburg (Ohio)rsquos rightsand claims all of which are expressly reserved In addition to this

certified mail return receipt requested version I am also sending

you a copy of this leer by regular first-class mail in case you refuse

to accept the certified mail version of this leer

Please respond by leer indicating your intention to cease and de-

sist from the use of the Winesburg trademark or any confusinglysimilar trademark within ten (983089983088) calendar days

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983092

We hope that this issue may be resolved this way so we can avoid

any further legal remedies as provided by state law and under fed-

eral law pursuant to the Lanham Act

Sincerely

Avery Nuit Esq

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983093

e town of Winesburg operates under the weak-mayor system al- ways has I am the city manager a creature of the council charged

by the council five elected members to keep the trash trucks run-

ning on time ere arenrsquot too many other municipal services to

aend to e fire department is volunteer e county provides

the police ere are the sewers of the town and I maintain them

myself and conduct the daily public tours e sewers of Wines-

burg are vast channeling one branch of the Fork River through

underground chambers and pools roofed with vaulted ceilings

tiled with ceramic-faced bricks Te sewers were the last public

works project of the Wabash and Erie Canal before the canal bank-

rupted the state of Indiana I mentioned tours but there arenrsquot that

many tourists interested in sewers I walk the tunnels alone my

footsteps on the paving stones echoing e drip drip drip of the

seeping water Te rapid splashing over the riprap Tere is the

landfill as well to manage the heart-shaped hole where the fossil-

rife limestone of the sewers was quarried punched in the table-

flat topography of a field north of Winesburg We are located on

the drained sandy bed of an ancient inland sea Sea birds from

the Great Lakes find their way to the pit circle and dive down below the rim emerging with beaks stuffed with human hair for

City Manager

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983094

their nests I guess Indiana has complicated laws concerning the

disposal of cut hair Much of the state transships its hair here A

thriving coage industry persists that of locket making using thespent anonymous hair to simulate the locks of a departed loved

one e lockets are aerthoughts fictional keepsakes e locket

makers can be seen rummaging through the rubbish of the dump

collecting bags of damp felt Winesburg was the first city in the

country to install the emergency 1048633983089983089 telephone number J Edward

Roush member of the House of Representatives was our con-

gressman and was instrumental in establishing the system I man-

age that too taking a shi at night usually in the old switching

room to answer the calls of the citizens of Winesburg who more

oen than not do have something emerging Usually not an acute

emergency but more a chronic unrest An anxiousness Not a heart

aack but a heartache I listen Te switches responding to the

impulse of someone somewhere dialing tsk and sigh and click Imanage I am the city manager

bull bull bull

I am not sure what to do with the cease and desist order I duly

received from the town of Winesburg Ohio I am not sure I under-stand how to cease and desist the steeping municipal sadness here

It is not as if I or anyone here can help it Years ago Fort Wayne

the statersquos second-largest city twenty miles to the east decided to

exhume its dead and to become like San Francisco free of cem-

eteries and graveyards Te consequence of the decision meant

transporting remains to multiple necropoli on the outskirts of Winesburg e newly dead still arrive daily carried by a special

midnight-blue fleet of North American Van Lines tractor-trailers

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 5: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983089

B983145983140983140983148983141983138983137983157983149 C983151983159983148983141983161 R983141983141983142983161 amp S983159983145983142983156 983148983148983152

W983145983150983141983155983138983157983154983143 O983144983145983151 983092983092983094983097983088

CEASE AND DESIST DEMAND

Pursuant to Title 983089983095 of the United States Code

City Manager

983089983091 Spalding Street

Winesburg Indiana 983092983094983095983089983090

Dear Sir or Madam

is law firm represents the Town of Winesburg (Ohio) If you

are represented by legal counsel please direct this leer to your

aorney immediately and have your aorney notify us of such

representation

It has been brought to our aention that your town Winesburg

(Indiana) has been using the Winesburg trademark in association

with the marketing or sale of your products and services namely

those of meditative introspection synthetic emotional effects

general literary malaise and cathartic artistic performances in-

cluding but not limited to confessions covetings secrets-keeping

and the wholesale packaging and propagation of spent signature

tears It is possible that you were unaware of this conflict so we

believe that it is in our mutual interest to bring this maer to your

aention

Winesburg is a registered trademark of our municipality Wines- burg (Ohio) and is used in conjunction with the distribution of

dramatic monologues and third-person narrations to invoke the

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090

grotesque and map the psychophysiological and neurotic manifes-

tations of its inhabitants in order to derive empathic and epiphanic

pleasure andor pain in a controlled hermetic seing Winesburgrsquosfederal trademark registration has been in full effect for over nine-

ty (1048633983088) years since shortly aer the publication of the book of

short stories Winesburg Ohio by Mr Sherwood Anderson at

Winesburg Ohio refers to a fictional town of Mr Andersonrsquos own

imagination modeled on the town of Clyde Ohio whose mali-

cious libel litigation with the estate of Mr Anderson continues to

this day e trademarked village of Winesburg (Ohio) was con-

structed in 9830891048633983090983088 in southwestern Paint Township of Holt County

by Austrian Mesmerists fleeing the dissolution of the Austro-Hun-

garian Empire aficionados of the book Winesburg Ohio and early

practitioners and adherents of applied phrenology and Gestalt

therapies A copy of the federal trademark registration is aached

for your reference as Exhibit A

Our federal registration of this trademark provides us with certain

proprietary rights is includes the right to restrict the use of the

trademark or a confusingly similar trademark in association with

confusingly similar products or services such as the distribution

of Sadness Fear Longing and Confusion itself We have patented

Madness We own Trembling We extensively market Grief We

facilitate the Recovery of Emotionally Paralyzing Memories and

the Reliving of Childhood Trauma We distribute Dirges and pro-

vide for all manner of Despairing Confession and Ecstatic Revela-

tion in this aesthetically framed and fictive community situated

on a glacial declivity near the second-largest Amish selement

in the United States e Lanham Act (the US Trademark Act)also provides numerous remedies for trademark infringement and

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 733

983091

dilution including but not limited to preliminary and permanent

injunctive relief money damages a defendantrsquos profits provisions

for the destruction or confiscation of infringing products and pro-motional materials and where intentional infringement is shown

(as would be the case here) aorneysrsquo fees and possible treble

money damages

It is urgent that we exercise our right to protect our trademark It

serves as an important and distinctive representation of the origin

of our products State and federal law supports our position thatconfusingly similar trademarks may cause confusion among cus-

tomers is confusion may cause substantial harm to the trade-

mark by facilitating the loss of its effectiveness in establishing a

distinct association between it our products and services and

the townrsquos goodwill

Due to these concerns and because unauthorized use of our fed-erally registered trademark amounts to an infringement of our

trademark rights we respectively request that you cease and desist

from any further use of the Winesburg trademark in association

with the sale marketing distribution promotion or other iden-

tification of your products or services

is leer is sent without prejudice to Winesburg (Ohio)rsquos rightsand claims all of which are expressly reserved In addition to this

certified mail return receipt requested version I am also sending

you a copy of this leer by regular first-class mail in case you refuse

to accept the certified mail version of this leer

Please respond by leer indicating your intention to cease and de-

sist from the use of the Winesburg trademark or any confusinglysimilar trademark within ten (983089983088) calendar days

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983092

We hope that this issue may be resolved this way so we can avoid

any further legal remedies as provided by state law and under fed-

eral law pursuant to the Lanham Act

Sincerely

Avery Nuit Esq

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983093

e town of Winesburg operates under the weak-mayor system al- ways has I am the city manager a creature of the council charged

by the council five elected members to keep the trash trucks run-

ning on time ere arenrsquot too many other municipal services to

aend to e fire department is volunteer e county provides

the police ere are the sewers of the town and I maintain them

myself and conduct the daily public tours e sewers of Wines-

burg are vast channeling one branch of the Fork River through

underground chambers and pools roofed with vaulted ceilings

tiled with ceramic-faced bricks Te sewers were the last public

works project of the Wabash and Erie Canal before the canal bank-

rupted the state of Indiana I mentioned tours but there arenrsquot that

many tourists interested in sewers I walk the tunnels alone my

footsteps on the paving stones echoing e drip drip drip of the

seeping water Te rapid splashing over the riprap Tere is the

landfill as well to manage the heart-shaped hole where the fossil-

rife limestone of the sewers was quarried punched in the table-

flat topography of a field north of Winesburg We are located on

the drained sandy bed of an ancient inland sea Sea birds from

the Great Lakes find their way to the pit circle and dive down below the rim emerging with beaks stuffed with human hair for

City Manager

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983094

their nests I guess Indiana has complicated laws concerning the

disposal of cut hair Much of the state transships its hair here A

thriving coage industry persists that of locket making using thespent anonymous hair to simulate the locks of a departed loved

one e lockets are aerthoughts fictional keepsakes e locket

makers can be seen rummaging through the rubbish of the dump

collecting bags of damp felt Winesburg was the first city in the

country to install the emergency 1048633983089983089 telephone number J Edward

Roush member of the House of Representatives was our con-

gressman and was instrumental in establishing the system I man-

age that too taking a shi at night usually in the old switching

room to answer the calls of the citizens of Winesburg who more

oen than not do have something emerging Usually not an acute

emergency but more a chronic unrest An anxiousness Not a heart

aack but a heartache I listen Te switches responding to the

impulse of someone somewhere dialing tsk and sigh and click Imanage I am the city manager

bull bull bull

I am not sure what to do with the cease and desist order I duly

received from the town of Winesburg Ohio I am not sure I under-stand how to cease and desist the steeping municipal sadness here

It is not as if I or anyone here can help it Years ago Fort Wayne

the statersquos second-largest city twenty miles to the east decided to

exhume its dead and to become like San Francisco free of cem-

eteries and graveyards Te consequence of the decision meant

transporting remains to multiple necropoli on the outskirts of Winesburg e newly dead still arrive daily carried by a special

midnight-blue fleet of North American Van Lines tractor-trailers

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 6: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

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983090

grotesque and map the psychophysiological and neurotic manifes-

tations of its inhabitants in order to derive empathic and epiphanic

pleasure andor pain in a controlled hermetic seing Winesburgrsquosfederal trademark registration has been in full effect for over nine-

ty (1048633983088) years since shortly aer the publication of the book of

short stories Winesburg Ohio by Mr Sherwood Anderson at

Winesburg Ohio refers to a fictional town of Mr Andersonrsquos own

imagination modeled on the town of Clyde Ohio whose mali-

cious libel litigation with the estate of Mr Anderson continues to

this day e trademarked village of Winesburg (Ohio) was con-

structed in 9830891048633983090983088 in southwestern Paint Township of Holt County

by Austrian Mesmerists fleeing the dissolution of the Austro-Hun-

garian Empire aficionados of the book Winesburg Ohio and early

practitioners and adherents of applied phrenology and Gestalt

therapies A copy of the federal trademark registration is aached

for your reference as Exhibit A

Our federal registration of this trademark provides us with certain

proprietary rights is includes the right to restrict the use of the

trademark or a confusingly similar trademark in association with

confusingly similar products or services such as the distribution

of Sadness Fear Longing and Confusion itself We have patented

Madness We own Trembling We extensively market Grief We

facilitate the Recovery of Emotionally Paralyzing Memories and

the Reliving of Childhood Trauma We distribute Dirges and pro-

vide for all manner of Despairing Confession and Ecstatic Revela-

tion in this aesthetically framed and fictive community situated

on a glacial declivity near the second-largest Amish selement

in the United States e Lanham Act (the US Trademark Act)also provides numerous remedies for trademark infringement and

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983091

dilution including but not limited to preliminary and permanent

injunctive relief money damages a defendantrsquos profits provisions

for the destruction or confiscation of infringing products and pro-motional materials and where intentional infringement is shown

(as would be the case here) aorneysrsquo fees and possible treble

money damages

It is urgent that we exercise our right to protect our trademark It

serves as an important and distinctive representation of the origin

of our products State and federal law supports our position thatconfusingly similar trademarks may cause confusion among cus-

tomers is confusion may cause substantial harm to the trade-

mark by facilitating the loss of its effectiveness in establishing a

distinct association between it our products and services and

the townrsquos goodwill

Due to these concerns and because unauthorized use of our fed-erally registered trademark amounts to an infringement of our

trademark rights we respectively request that you cease and desist

from any further use of the Winesburg trademark in association

with the sale marketing distribution promotion or other iden-

tification of your products or services

is leer is sent without prejudice to Winesburg (Ohio)rsquos rightsand claims all of which are expressly reserved In addition to this

certified mail return receipt requested version I am also sending

you a copy of this leer by regular first-class mail in case you refuse

to accept the certified mail version of this leer

Please respond by leer indicating your intention to cease and de-

sist from the use of the Winesburg trademark or any confusinglysimilar trademark within ten (983089983088) calendar days

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983092

We hope that this issue may be resolved this way so we can avoid

any further legal remedies as provided by state law and under fed-

eral law pursuant to the Lanham Act

Sincerely

Avery Nuit Esq

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983093

e town of Winesburg operates under the weak-mayor system al- ways has I am the city manager a creature of the council charged

by the council five elected members to keep the trash trucks run-

ning on time ere arenrsquot too many other municipal services to

aend to e fire department is volunteer e county provides

the police ere are the sewers of the town and I maintain them

myself and conduct the daily public tours e sewers of Wines-

burg are vast channeling one branch of the Fork River through

underground chambers and pools roofed with vaulted ceilings

tiled with ceramic-faced bricks Te sewers were the last public

works project of the Wabash and Erie Canal before the canal bank-

rupted the state of Indiana I mentioned tours but there arenrsquot that

many tourists interested in sewers I walk the tunnels alone my

footsteps on the paving stones echoing e drip drip drip of the

seeping water Te rapid splashing over the riprap Tere is the

landfill as well to manage the heart-shaped hole where the fossil-

rife limestone of the sewers was quarried punched in the table-

flat topography of a field north of Winesburg We are located on

the drained sandy bed of an ancient inland sea Sea birds from

the Great Lakes find their way to the pit circle and dive down below the rim emerging with beaks stuffed with human hair for

City Manager

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983094

their nests I guess Indiana has complicated laws concerning the

disposal of cut hair Much of the state transships its hair here A

thriving coage industry persists that of locket making using thespent anonymous hair to simulate the locks of a departed loved

one e lockets are aerthoughts fictional keepsakes e locket

makers can be seen rummaging through the rubbish of the dump

collecting bags of damp felt Winesburg was the first city in the

country to install the emergency 1048633983089983089 telephone number J Edward

Roush member of the House of Representatives was our con-

gressman and was instrumental in establishing the system I man-

age that too taking a shi at night usually in the old switching

room to answer the calls of the citizens of Winesburg who more

oen than not do have something emerging Usually not an acute

emergency but more a chronic unrest An anxiousness Not a heart

aack but a heartache I listen Te switches responding to the

impulse of someone somewhere dialing tsk and sigh and click Imanage I am the city manager

bull bull bull

I am not sure what to do with the cease and desist order I duly

received from the town of Winesburg Ohio I am not sure I under-stand how to cease and desist the steeping municipal sadness here

It is not as if I or anyone here can help it Years ago Fort Wayne

the statersquos second-largest city twenty miles to the east decided to

exhume its dead and to become like San Francisco free of cem-

eteries and graveyards Te consequence of the decision meant

transporting remains to multiple necropoli on the outskirts of Winesburg e newly dead still arrive daily carried by a special

midnight-blue fleet of North American Van Lines tractor-trailers

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 7: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

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983091

dilution including but not limited to preliminary and permanent

injunctive relief money damages a defendantrsquos profits provisions

for the destruction or confiscation of infringing products and pro-motional materials and where intentional infringement is shown

(as would be the case here) aorneysrsquo fees and possible treble

money damages

It is urgent that we exercise our right to protect our trademark It

serves as an important and distinctive representation of the origin

of our products State and federal law supports our position thatconfusingly similar trademarks may cause confusion among cus-

tomers is confusion may cause substantial harm to the trade-

mark by facilitating the loss of its effectiveness in establishing a

distinct association between it our products and services and

the townrsquos goodwill

Due to these concerns and because unauthorized use of our fed-erally registered trademark amounts to an infringement of our

trademark rights we respectively request that you cease and desist

from any further use of the Winesburg trademark in association

with the sale marketing distribution promotion or other iden-

tification of your products or services

is leer is sent without prejudice to Winesburg (Ohio)rsquos rightsand claims all of which are expressly reserved In addition to this

certified mail return receipt requested version I am also sending

you a copy of this leer by regular first-class mail in case you refuse

to accept the certified mail version of this leer

Please respond by leer indicating your intention to cease and de-

sist from the use of the Winesburg trademark or any confusinglysimilar trademark within ten (983089983088) calendar days

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983092

We hope that this issue may be resolved this way so we can avoid

any further legal remedies as provided by state law and under fed-

eral law pursuant to the Lanham Act

Sincerely

Avery Nuit Esq

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983093

e town of Winesburg operates under the weak-mayor system al- ways has I am the city manager a creature of the council charged

by the council five elected members to keep the trash trucks run-

ning on time ere arenrsquot too many other municipal services to

aend to e fire department is volunteer e county provides

the police ere are the sewers of the town and I maintain them

myself and conduct the daily public tours e sewers of Wines-

burg are vast channeling one branch of the Fork River through

underground chambers and pools roofed with vaulted ceilings

tiled with ceramic-faced bricks Te sewers were the last public

works project of the Wabash and Erie Canal before the canal bank-

rupted the state of Indiana I mentioned tours but there arenrsquot that

many tourists interested in sewers I walk the tunnels alone my

footsteps on the paving stones echoing e drip drip drip of the

seeping water Te rapid splashing over the riprap Tere is the

landfill as well to manage the heart-shaped hole where the fossil-

rife limestone of the sewers was quarried punched in the table-

flat topography of a field north of Winesburg We are located on

the drained sandy bed of an ancient inland sea Sea birds from

the Great Lakes find their way to the pit circle and dive down below the rim emerging with beaks stuffed with human hair for

City Manager

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983094

their nests I guess Indiana has complicated laws concerning the

disposal of cut hair Much of the state transships its hair here A

thriving coage industry persists that of locket making using thespent anonymous hair to simulate the locks of a departed loved

one e lockets are aerthoughts fictional keepsakes e locket

makers can be seen rummaging through the rubbish of the dump

collecting bags of damp felt Winesburg was the first city in the

country to install the emergency 1048633983089983089 telephone number J Edward

Roush member of the House of Representatives was our con-

gressman and was instrumental in establishing the system I man-

age that too taking a shi at night usually in the old switching

room to answer the calls of the citizens of Winesburg who more

oen than not do have something emerging Usually not an acute

emergency but more a chronic unrest An anxiousness Not a heart

aack but a heartache I listen Te switches responding to the

impulse of someone somewhere dialing tsk and sigh and click Imanage I am the city manager

bull bull bull

I am not sure what to do with the cease and desist order I duly

received from the town of Winesburg Ohio I am not sure I under-stand how to cease and desist the steeping municipal sadness here

It is not as if I or anyone here can help it Years ago Fort Wayne

the statersquos second-largest city twenty miles to the east decided to

exhume its dead and to become like San Francisco free of cem-

eteries and graveyards Te consequence of the decision meant

transporting remains to multiple necropoli on the outskirts of Winesburg e newly dead still arrive daily carried by a special

midnight-blue fleet of North American Van Lines tractor-trailers

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 8: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983092

We hope that this issue may be resolved this way so we can avoid

any further legal remedies as provided by state law and under fed-

eral law pursuant to the Lanham Act

Sincerely

Avery Nuit Esq

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983093

e town of Winesburg operates under the weak-mayor system al- ways has I am the city manager a creature of the council charged

by the council five elected members to keep the trash trucks run-

ning on time ere arenrsquot too many other municipal services to

aend to e fire department is volunteer e county provides

the police ere are the sewers of the town and I maintain them

myself and conduct the daily public tours e sewers of Wines-

burg are vast channeling one branch of the Fork River through

underground chambers and pools roofed with vaulted ceilings

tiled with ceramic-faced bricks Te sewers were the last public

works project of the Wabash and Erie Canal before the canal bank-

rupted the state of Indiana I mentioned tours but there arenrsquot that

many tourists interested in sewers I walk the tunnels alone my

footsteps on the paving stones echoing e drip drip drip of the

seeping water Te rapid splashing over the riprap Tere is the

landfill as well to manage the heart-shaped hole where the fossil-

rife limestone of the sewers was quarried punched in the table-

flat topography of a field north of Winesburg We are located on

the drained sandy bed of an ancient inland sea Sea birds from

the Great Lakes find their way to the pit circle and dive down below the rim emerging with beaks stuffed with human hair for

City Manager

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983094

their nests I guess Indiana has complicated laws concerning the

disposal of cut hair Much of the state transships its hair here A

thriving coage industry persists that of locket making using thespent anonymous hair to simulate the locks of a departed loved

one e lockets are aerthoughts fictional keepsakes e locket

makers can be seen rummaging through the rubbish of the dump

collecting bags of damp felt Winesburg was the first city in the

country to install the emergency 1048633983089983089 telephone number J Edward

Roush member of the House of Representatives was our con-

gressman and was instrumental in establishing the system I man-

age that too taking a shi at night usually in the old switching

room to answer the calls of the citizens of Winesburg who more

oen than not do have something emerging Usually not an acute

emergency but more a chronic unrest An anxiousness Not a heart

aack but a heartache I listen Te switches responding to the

impulse of someone somewhere dialing tsk and sigh and click Imanage I am the city manager

bull bull bull

I am not sure what to do with the cease and desist order I duly

received from the town of Winesburg Ohio I am not sure I under-stand how to cease and desist the steeping municipal sadness here

It is not as if I or anyone here can help it Years ago Fort Wayne

the statersquos second-largest city twenty miles to the east decided to

exhume its dead and to become like San Francisco free of cem-

eteries and graveyards Te consequence of the decision meant

transporting remains to multiple necropoli on the outskirts of Winesburg e newly dead still arrive daily carried by a special

midnight-blue fleet of North American Van Lines tractor-trailers

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 9: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

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983093

e town of Winesburg operates under the weak-mayor system al- ways has I am the city manager a creature of the council charged

by the council five elected members to keep the trash trucks run-

ning on time ere arenrsquot too many other municipal services to

aend to e fire department is volunteer e county provides

the police ere are the sewers of the town and I maintain them

myself and conduct the daily public tours e sewers of Wines-

burg are vast channeling one branch of the Fork River through

underground chambers and pools roofed with vaulted ceilings

tiled with ceramic-faced bricks Te sewers were the last public

works project of the Wabash and Erie Canal before the canal bank-

rupted the state of Indiana I mentioned tours but there arenrsquot that

many tourists interested in sewers I walk the tunnels alone my

footsteps on the paving stones echoing e drip drip drip of the

seeping water Te rapid splashing over the riprap Tere is the

landfill as well to manage the heart-shaped hole where the fossil-

rife limestone of the sewers was quarried punched in the table-

flat topography of a field north of Winesburg We are located on

the drained sandy bed of an ancient inland sea Sea birds from

the Great Lakes find their way to the pit circle and dive down below the rim emerging with beaks stuffed with human hair for

City Manager

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983094

their nests I guess Indiana has complicated laws concerning the

disposal of cut hair Much of the state transships its hair here A

thriving coage industry persists that of locket making using thespent anonymous hair to simulate the locks of a departed loved

one e lockets are aerthoughts fictional keepsakes e locket

makers can be seen rummaging through the rubbish of the dump

collecting bags of damp felt Winesburg was the first city in the

country to install the emergency 1048633983089983089 telephone number J Edward

Roush member of the House of Representatives was our con-

gressman and was instrumental in establishing the system I man-

age that too taking a shi at night usually in the old switching

room to answer the calls of the citizens of Winesburg who more

oen than not do have something emerging Usually not an acute

emergency but more a chronic unrest An anxiousness Not a heart

aack but a heartache I listen Te switches responding to the

impulse of someone somewhere dialing tsk and sigh and click Imanage I am the city manager

bull bull bull

I am not sure what to do with the cease and desist order I duly

received from the town of Winesburg Ohio I am not sure I under-stand how to cease and desist the steeping municipal sadness here

It is not as if I or anyone here can help it Years ago Fort Wayne

the statersquos second-largest city twenty miles to the east decided to

exhume its dead and to become like San Francisco free of cem-

eteries and graveyards Te consequence of the decision meant

transporting remains to multiple necropoli on the outskirts of Winesburg e newly dead still arrive daily carried by a special

midnight-blue fleet of North American Van Lines tractor-trailers

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 10: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

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983094

their nests I guess Indiana has complicated laws concerning the

disposal of cut hair Much of the state transships its hair here A

thriving coage industry persists that of locket making using thespent anonymous hair to simulate the locks of a departed loved

one e lockets are aerthoughts fictional keepsakes e locket

makers can be seen rummaging through the rubbish of the dump

collecting bags of damp felt Winesburg was the first city in the

country to install the emergency 1048633983089983089 telephone number J Edward

Roush member of the House of Representatives was our con-

gressman and was instrumental in establishing the system I man-

age that too taking a shi at night usually in the old switching

room to answer the calls of the citizens of Winesburg who more

oen than not do have something emerging Usually not an acute

emergency but more a chronic unrest An anxiousness Not a heart

aack but a heartache I listen Te switches responding to the

impulse of someone somewhere dialing tsk and sigh and click Imanage I am the city manager

bull bull bull

I am not sure what to do with the cease and desist order I duly

received from the town of Winesburg Ohio I am not sure I under-stand how to cease and desist the steeping municipal sadness here

It is not as if I or anyone here can help it Years ago Fort Wayne

the statersquos second-largest city twenty miles to the east decided to

exhume its dead and to become like San Francisco free of cem-

eteries and graveyards Te consequence of the decision meant

transporting remains to multiple necropoli on the outskirts of Winesburg e newly dead still arrive daily carried by a special

midnight-blue fleet of North American Van Lines tractor-trailers

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 11: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

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983095

escorted up the Lincoln Highway by the Allen County Sheriffrsquos

Department I must admit it is our biggest industry bigger than

the box factory the eraser works and the cheese product plant Wetend We tend the dead And the funereal permeates this place in

the way fluoxetine in all its manifestations saturates the sewers of

Winesburg the spilled and pissed SSRIs of the citizenry sluicing

into the water table beneath the fossil seabed of an ancient extinct

inland sea Our deathly still suburbs Our industrious dust Our

subterranean chemistry Our tenuous analog telephony Our thin

threads of wistful connection What am I to do How am I to

cease desist Manage

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 12: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983096

It all started innocently enough when I petitioned the Most Rev-erend Leo bishop of the Diocese of Fort WaynendashSouth Bend to

initiate the beatification of Father Herman Heilmann founder

of the monastery Our Lady of the Circumcision here in Wines-

burg Father Herman made a home for his brother fathers who

come from all over the country to this quiet cloistered retreatmdasha

collection of cabins initially converted from the rundown Rail

Splier Motor Court off the old Lincoln Highwaymdashto study and

pray and meditate on that old Old Testament story of Abraham

having to sacrifice his son Isaac to establish the covenant with the

Lord I just thought the Fatherrsquos work needed to be recognized so

in addition to my leer-writing campaign I convinced my reading

group to concentrate on one book for a year deeply meditating

on the martyrs spending each meeting discussing a life of a saint

we read in Butlerrsquos Lives of the Saints It was difficult to say the

least e litanies of the deaths and the dying the various methods

of torture and the infliction of pain seemed organized in such a

way as to demonstrate the excruciating genius of Satan working

through his minions on earth to exact uer and endless agony

My reading group made up of several of the neighborhoodrsquos ladiesand ladies from the church also met on Wednesdays each spring

Amanda Patch

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 13: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 1333

983097

to follow the March Madness of the basketball tournament sus-

pending our usual stock club meetings to substitute the brackets

for the fine print of the big board We were perhaps predisposedto such communal excitement some might even say hysteria As

we read and reported on the lives of the saints our presentations

became more elaborate the distinction between the mere abstract

recounting of the material and actually living the lives of the Lives

of the Saints became confused for us and very soon we became

enamored by the very particular narratives of the sainted virgins We were impressed with the passion of their passion to remain

undeflowered intact innocent and dedicated to Jesus to the

point of taking Our Savior as a wedded yet chaste husband ere

were (I remember how could I forget) multiple incinerations at

the stake crucifixions beheadings stonings rapes and sodom-

ies with a variety of implements and animals in an effort to pry

from these devoted young women the most special jewel in their

possession It was all quite thrilling We were moved e antique

prose of the text added a musty patina of gothic authenticity to the

recitations of anguish courage and ecstatic exultation All of us

by this time were far from our own corporeal purity having given

birth to nearly four dozen children among us Many of us now

were grandmothers as well We had long suffered both the pangs

of birthing and the fandangos of sexual intercourse procreative

and not at the hands of our husbands and dare I say lovers I am

not sure whose idea it was initially as many of us have used the

skilled services of Dr Minnick for other plastic operative rear-

rangements but we somehow reached a consensus that all of us

would participate in a kind of tontine in reverse We would notso much wait to unstop the cork of a pilfered ldquoliberatedrdquo brandy

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 14: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

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983089983088

but to stop it all back up again in the first place You have heard of

womenrsquos clubs such as ours creating calendars of their members

photographed tastefully nude a fundraiser for charity Our idea was only we thought a slight variation on such projects Perhaps it

was Dr Minnick himself who suggested it inviting us to consider

reconstructive surgeries ldquodown thererdquo commenting that labia re-

duction was now his most performed and profitable operation

the norming and neatening up if you will of the pudenda to the

standard folds and tus bolsters and grooves of the ideal cos-

metic model Again we were thrilled that such miracles could

be performed relatively painlessly in an outpatient seing But

I did know for a fact that this would not suit us We proposed to

Dr Minnick that he aempt to go beyond the mere landscaping

of what could be seen but also seek the unseen to take us back in

time To state it simplymdashto reaach our long-gone maidenhoods

cinching closed once more the orifice of our experience virginalonce more And this he did was anxious to do Inventing a kind

of embroidered helmet for the task he wove the cap together from

multicolored and multigauged sutures a kind of monofilament

cartilage tissue e truth is when we are together now reading

further into the lives of the saints and the endless mortifications

of the flesh we continue to admire in great detail during our break for cookies and tea his handiwork performed on each and

every one of us and how such emendations have delivered us all

strangely beautiful and pristine one step closer to God

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 15: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983093

Prepared by Amanda Pach wih he aid o he Ladies o he La-dies Book Clubs o Our Lady o he Circumcision Roman Caholic

Church and he Greek Orhodox Church o Sain Dymphna locaed

in Winesburg Indiana

is reading group guide for the book Winesburg Indiana includes

an introduction and questions for discussion with suggestions for

enhancing your book clubrsquos group reading of the book Winesburg

Indiana e following questions (we hope) will help your reading

group discover new angles and interesting topics as you grope with

the discussable aspects of this book We pray that these ideas (more

like asides really or hastily recorded spontaneous uerances or

Freudian slips or [at the very least] exasperated extemporaneous

train wrecks of thought) we gleaned from our own ongoing and (it

seems) endless contestations with this book Winesburg Indiana

(which presents itself as an innocent collection of transcriptions of

our own [the citizens of the said town of Winesburg Indiana] dark

musings desperate confessions miscalculated memoirs autocor-

rected autobiographies therapeutic narratives deranged screeds

uncorroborated gossip dangerously personal digressions and befuddled baffled protestations of personal history) will enrich

Book Club Guide

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 16: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983094

your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book the

aforementioned Winesburg Indiana and (it seems) the overly chat-

ty and personal boundary-crossing citizenry of the eponymousmunicipality of Winesburg Indiana our home town

983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

Published in 983090983088983089983093 Winesburg Indiana is a modern classic that

documents the inner lives of the inhabitants of a typical small

Midwestern town in a series of narratives that originally wished

to employ ldquofree indirect discourserdquo but quickly seled into dis-

tracted and meandering digressions of its charactersrsquo individual

neuroses psychological dysfunctions and generally deranged

psychopathies that created a somewhat sad but also a euphoric

survivor-like guilt-free guilt in the reader as he or she negotiates a

post-post-traumatic landscape peopled by anxious people anxiousto get all the anxiety out

983124983151983152983145983139983155 983137983150983140 983121983157983141 983155983156983145983151983150983155 983142983151983154 983108983145983155983139983157983155983155983145983151983150

1 Discuss the anthology ormat o the book Why canrsquot therejust be one author of this book instead of a whole bunch

of authors who all appear to have something different in

mind e books Winesburg Ohio and Spoon River Anhology

both have just one author and they seem to have kept it all

together It worked out just fine (in Dorcus Henryrsquos opinion in

any case) And while we are on the subject why did we haveto have a book at all about us and our town o Winesburg

when that other book about the other Winesburg already

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 17: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 1733

983090983088983095

existed If you ask us (and you canrsquot since we have been in-

structed by the City Manager not to discuss the book openly

but add our furtive meetings on the topic to the litany of se-crets already catalogued and presented here in the book we are

talking about not talking about) it seems like a pervasive and

pernicious failure of the imagination

2 Who did you identiy with the most Did you see parts o

yourself in any one specific character You might gather this

is a big problem with us as many of us find ourselves as char-

acters in the book Winesburg Indiana and in the town Wines-

burg Indiana and upon finding ourselves there or there we

go on to find we really donrsquot know who we really are What is

perhaps more disturbing is that if you ask any one of us (and

remember you really shouldnrsquot) we would probably say that

we identified more closely with somebody other than our ownselves rendered in these pages estranged and alienated as we

are from ourselvesrsquo selves is is a real problem for the Cantor

Quadruplets who beyond suffering the garden-variety aban-

donment issues are multiply afflicted by a highly amplified

separation anxiety making it impossible for any one quad to

differentiate one quad from another and all of them reflectedagain and again in the mirrored finish of that Airstream Trailer

of theirs

3 Choose one character rom the book and discuss i he or

she is sympathetic Could you imagine being riends with

him or her Why or why not Really we would like to know We would like to be liked It is difficult for us just to sustain a

book club or two in this village as the Reading Group Guides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 1833

983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 1933

983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2033

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2133

983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2233

983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2333

983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2433

983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2533

983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

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983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 18: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 1833

983090983088983096

we utilize at the back of the books we read rarely prompt any

discussion really We tend not to like each other as our ability

to like ourselves is problematic Most of us believe that as weread the books silently and alone our meetings should be con-

ducted mostly in silence and its members distributed evenly

throughout the rooms of that monthrsquos hostrsquos house I suspect

that the meetings of my group most oen meet at my house

because my house has many rooms and many closets in its

many rooms What discussion there is is most oen muffled

baffled as we are by the books the architecture of the house

and each other

4 Who is Emile Durkheim No really we would like to know

this too And why is our high school named afer him And

why were the lockers at the high school locked by overly com-

plicated combination locks that seemed to also randomly and without warning or explanation recalibrate the combinations

of a number of lockers each and every morning so that the

halls even aer the last bell before homeroom were filled with

students entering again and again obsolete formulas on the

lockerrsquos dial punctuated by protracted bouts of staring off into

space displaying an aspect that could only be characterized asprofound forgetfulness andor ordinary substantial and per-

sistent dread

5 Henry David oreau wrote in Walden ldquoe mass of men lead

lives of quiet desperation What is called resignation is con-

firmed desperation From the desperate city you go into thedesperate country and have to console yourself with the brav-

ery of minks and muskrats A stereotyped but unconscious

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 1933

983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2033

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2133

983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2233

983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2333

983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2433

983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2533

983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2633

983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 19: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 1933

983090983088983097

despair is concealed even under what are called the games

and amusements of mankind ere is no play in them for this

comes aer work But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to dodesperate thingsrdquo Does this sound like anyone you know

rom the book We named our grand park aer the Sage of

Walden who we understand still had his mother do his laun-

dry even aer he removed to his cabin in the woods Many of

us read Winesburg Indiana while in hammocks we installed

among the trees of row Park (a misspelling on the original

plat map that seems to have stuck around) ere are plenty of

muskrats and minks there as well inhabiting the banks and

mudflats of the West Fork of the Fork River a disappearing

river alas in this underlying karst region

6 Winesburg Indiana grapples with complex universally difficult

stages of birth life and death What reflections i any did it

inspire in you about your own lie Whose lie story reso-

nated most deeply in you You donrsquot really have to answer

that Having goen to know us by reading our various and

vexed life stories allow us to say it may just have been enough

for you to observe from afar (watching each episode unfold

and the whole crazed catastrophe of this place) with pity andhorror in order to exorcise and exercise your own cathartic

apparatus of feeling a sump pump if you will for the flush of

synthetic and synaptic emotional neap tides

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2033

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2133

983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2233

983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2333

983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2433

983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2533

983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2633

983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 20: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2033

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2133

983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2233

983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2333

983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2433

983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2533

983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2633

983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 21: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2133

983090983089983089

983106 983137 983154 983138 983137 983154 983137 983106 983141 983137 983150

ldquoFrances Parkerrdquo

Barbara Bean is the author of Dream House a collection of stories

Her fiction has appeared in the Georgia Review the Colorado Re-

view the Norh American Review and the Norhwes Review among

others She lives in Greencastle Indiana where she taught creative

writing and literature at DePauw University

Queen Annersquos lace horsemint buerfly weed the great blue

heron and buzzards always buzzardsmdashJuly in Indiana

983115983137983156983141 983106983141983154983150983144983141983145983149983141983154

ldquoProfessor Helen C Andersenrdquo

Kate Bernheimer is the author of a novel trilogy and the story col-lections Horse Flower Bird and How a Moher Weaned Her Girl

om Fairy ales and the editor of four anthologies including the

World Fantasy Awardndashwinning and best-selling My Moher She

Killed Me My Faher He Ae Me Fory New Fairy ales and xo Or-

pheus Fify New Myhs

Contributors

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2233

983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2333

983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2433

983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2533

983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2633

983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 22: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2233

983090983089983090

983122983151983138983145983150 983106983148983137983139983147

ldquoBeau Morrowrdquo

Robin Black author of the books I I Loved You I Would ell YouTis and Lie Drawing is one of those irritating East Coasters who

had never heard of Indiana until she was nineteen driving cross-

country with three women when there was a stop in Indianapolis

a parking lot at night strangely bright lights everywhere someone

needing a cup of coffee but Black didnrsquot leave the car so techni-

cally she has never set foot in the state She hopes to remedy thatone day She hears itrsquos nice

983115983137 983154 983141 983150 983106 983154 983141 983150 983150 983137 983150

ldquoPete Waste Lab Technicianrdquo

Karen Brennan is the author of seven books of varying genres

including fiction nonfiction and poetry She is a core faculty

member of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers

and a Professor Emerita at the University of Utah Karen Brennan

has never been to Indiana and has acquired most of her knowl-

edge of that state from the plume facile of Michael Martone Her

boyfriend Stephen reports that while driving across the country

in 9830891048633983094983095 his car broke down in Indiana due to a faulty valve e

Indiana mechanic removed the valve and for the rest of the cross-country drive his carmdasha ldquoclunkerrdquo anywaymdashsounded like a ma-

chine gun

983106983154983145983137983150 983106983157983139983147983138983141983141

ldquoClyderdquo

Brian Buckbee grew up in Illinois not far from the western borderof Indiana went to school in Ohio not far from the eastern border

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2333

983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2433

983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2533

983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2633

983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 23: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2333

983090983089983091

of Indiana failed to marry a woman he loved from central Indiana

and raced into and out of Indiana fast as he could up Route 983094983093 one

terrifying night during the tornado outbreak of June 98308910486331048633983088 For ashort time he worked as the head security guard at the Field of

Light Bulbs in Pulaski County On November 983089 9830891048633983096983095 Brian made

a pilgrimage to the Hoosier Dome to see a U983090 concert and was

rewardedmdashand altered forevermdashby a surprise performance by

the rarely seen Dalton Brothers who themselves call into ques-

tion what is real what is not and surely inspired Brian to write

about Clyde Vice President Hendricks Leonard Nimoy and the

famously elusive NBA star Billy Joe Cuthbert

983123983144983137983150983150983151983150 983107983137983145983150

ldquoOccupy Winesburgrdquo

Last year Shannon Cain drove across the United States on the

interstates and didnrsquot even realize shersquod been through Indiana un-til she reached Virginia and consulted a map Reeling from that

loss she now sticks to the back roads Her first book Te Necessiy

o Cerain Behaviors won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize Her

stories have also been recognized with the O Henry Prize two

Pushcarts and a grant from the NEA Shannon makes a living

as a manuscript consultant and writing coach She lives in ParisFrance

983123983144983141983154983154983145 983141 983110983148983145983139983147

ldquoEmmalenersquos Bakery and Bait Shoprdquo

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness

and the forthcoming short story collection Whiskey Ec Her flashfiction appears in many anthologies and journals including Flash

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2433

983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2533

983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2633

983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 24: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2433

983090983089983092

Ficion Forward and New Sudden Ficion She lives in Pisburgh

but dreams of Winesburg Indiana as the heart of the heart of the

Midwest Her website is sherrieflickcom983106983154983161983137983150 983110983157983154983157983150983141983155983155

Co-editor

Bryan Furuness was born in East Chicago Indiana a town whose

identity crisis is apparent in its name Is it Chicago or is it Indiana

He grew up on Chicago time watching the Chicago Bears play on

Chicago television stations At the same time the town is clearly

located in Indiana a state which Bryan knew a great deal about

thanks largely to his mother who taught state history to her fourth

graders and took Bryan along on all her trips to state parks and

historical sites So the answer is Yes and yes But also No and no

No one from Chicago has ever counted East Chicago as Actual

Chicago And the rest of Indiana openly despises and disavowsthis strip of industrialized Indiana along the lakemdashreferred to as

ldquoda regionrdquomdashbecause of the unions and le-leaning politics and

general lack of corn (Another possible answer given by a coast-

dweller would be Who cares Yoursquore all Midwesterners) Eventu-

ally Bryan would dri downstate to Indianapolis though he set

his novel Te Los Episodes o Revie Bryson in the no-manrsquos-landof the region Now he teaches at Butler University where he also

serves as the advisor for Manuscrips the undergraduate literary

magazine Next to his desk is a bookshelf containing a copy of ev-

ery issue of Manuscrips dating back to 9830891048633983091983092 including a few issues

filled with stories by a young Michael Martone Now he thinks

the answer is yes and no and yes and nomdashthe region like a steel ball held in perfect tension between two magnets with like poles

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2533

983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2633

983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 25: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2533

983090983089983093

983122983151983160983137983150983141 983111983137983161

ldquoTara Jenkinsrdquo

Roxane Gay lives and writes in the Midwest She recently movedto Indiana to teach at Purdue University

983106 983114 983112983151983148983148983137 983154983155

ldquoReverend Daverdquo

B J Hollars is the author of three books of nonfictionmdashmost re-

cently Dispaches fom he Drowningsmdashas well as a collection ofstories Sighings A native of Fort Wayne Indiana (where a bust of

Michael Martone is displayed prominently in the entryway of the

public library) Hollars currently serves as an Assistant Professor

of Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

983107 983114 983112983154983145983138983137 983148

ldquoJackie Patchrdquo and ldquoJulie Patchrdquo

C J Hribal is the author of the novels Te Company Car and Amer-

ican Beauy and the short fiction collections Matyrsquos Hear and Te

Clouds in Memphis which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction

He also edited Te Boundaries o wiligh Czecho-Slovak Wriing

om he New World He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of

English at Marquee University and a member of the fiction fac-ulty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers He

fondly remembers puing pennies on the railroad tracks in West

Lafayee Indiana with his children and hiking along the Wabash

River with his friends He also once helped paint a house in Vevay

Indiana for his brother-in-law and likes that some of the rest areas

on Indianarsquos toll roads are named aer Indiana writers though theidea of privatizing the rest stops was just plain silly

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2633

983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 26: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2633

983090983089983094

983105983150983140983154983141983159 983112983157 983140983143983145983150983155

ldquoRaymond Snowrdquo

Andrew Hudgins is the author most recently of a book of po-ems A Clown a Midnigh and a memoir about being a compulsive

joke-teller Te Joker He teaches at e Ohio State University and

is married to the novelist Erin McGraw a graduate of the MFA

Program at Indiana University He spent many happy hours in

and around Bloomington when he was first seeing her and she was

teaching at DePauw

983123983141983137983150 983116983151983158983141983148983137983139983141

ldquoe Processed Cheese Product Manrdquo

Sean Lovelace lives in Indiana near a variety of corn where he

directs the Creative Writing Program at Ball State University His

latest collection is about Velveeta He blogs at seanlovelacecom

He likes to run far

983116983141983141 983117983137983154983156983145983150

ldquoMiss Gladysrdquo

Lee Martin has published three memoirs most recently Such a

Lie He is also the author of four novels including Break he Skin

and Te Brigh Forever a finalist for the 983090983088983088983094 Pulitzer Prize in Fic-tion He grew up in Illinois just across the river from Vincennes

Indiana the land of George Rogers Clark Alice o Old Vincennes

Red Skelton and peach orchards and melon patches He now lives

in Columbus Ohio and teaches in the MFA Program at e Ohio

State University

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 27: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2733

983090983089983095

983117983145983139983144983137983141983148 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoBiddlebaum Cowley Reef y amp Swi LLPrdquo ldquoCity Managerrdquo

ldquoAmanda Patchrdquo ldquoDale Rumseyrdquo ldquoKen of OumwardquoldquoJacques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a

Diner in Winesburg Indianardquo ldquoConstance H Wootinrdquo

ldquoWalt lsquoHelperrsquo Voltzrdquo ldquoFound in the Placebo e Year-

book of Emile Durkheim High Schoolrdquo ldquoGregg Pimanrdquo

ldquoCarol Clayrdquo ldquoe Cantor Quadrupletsrdquo and ldquoInspector 983092rdquo

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne Indiana Growing upin Indiana a teenaged Martone along with many of his age-mates

took summertime employment in the agricultural sector of the

statersquos economy It was a rite of passage to ride the mechanical

carriers through the extensive seed corn fields that surrounded the

nearby small town of Winesburg Indiana detasseling the plant in

order to produce hybridized strains of the grain Martone enjoyed

driing above the tasseling plants the ocean of vinyl green corn

a vortex swirling around him He usually worked in fields planted

in 983092983089 panels four female rows of one variety to be detasseled and

one bull row le to pollinate e blocks created a wavy paern

in the fields he sailed over carefully unspooling the threads of the

tassels from the tangle of leaves the machines had missed At other

times he rouged as well walking the shaded rows searching for

the volunteer starts and preventing their undesirable pollen from

taking root in the precious hybridizing At night aer the long day

of gleaning every strand from every plant Martone would dream

he was a dusty bee or a caked buerfly staggering from one forest

of tassels to the next into the chromatic confusion of the morn-

ing And in the fall aer school had started up again he returnedto the now harvested fields the sharp stubble laced with frost

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 28: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2833

983090983089983096

and huddled under the scratchy wool blankets in the back of an

old buckboard bumping through the empty fields near the small

town of Winesburg a passenger on one of the last real hayrides inIndiana and whispered to the girl beside him the intricate secrets

of the intriguing sex life of corn

983123983137983149 983117 983137983154983156983151983150983141

ldquoRandy Steeplerdquo

Sam Martone lives and writes in Tempe Arizona Growing up

he celebrated Christmas with his grandparents who set up hun-

dreds of animatronic singing and dancing Santa Clauses through-

out their house in Fort Wayne Indiana Every year when Sam

Martone arrived his grandparents took him through the house

showing off the new additions pressing buons and motioning in

front of sensors saying ldquoTake a look at this one is one hererdquo

983109983154983145 983150 983117983139983111983154 983137983159

ldquoDeanne Stoversrdquo

Erin McGraw is the author of six books of fiction three novels and

three collections of stories She lived in Indiana for ten years first

writing and then teaching and bears the Hoosier mark To this

day she is convinced that she canrsquot buy liquor on Sundays

983114983151983161 983141983148983148 983141 983117983139983123983159 983141 983141983150 983141983161

ldquoe Bolerdquo

An invasive species with lustrous petals and a glabrous stem non-

native Joyelle McSweeney teaches at the University of Notre Dame

and lives in South Bend She is the author of six books of poetry

and prose most recently Percussion Grenade and Salamandrine

983096 Gohics Her play Dead Youh or he Leaks won the inaugural

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 29: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 2933

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 30: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3033

983090983090983088

lived here (or there depending again on your point of view) her

whole life From this (or that) place she has wrien several books

and flung them out into the world She has also raised two childrenand taught many many students who have flung themselves out

into that same world the one outside of the double circle

983115983141983148983139983141983161 983109983154983158983145983139983147 983120983137983154983147983141983154

ldquoLimberlostrdquo

Kelcey Ervick Parker is the author of Lilianersquos Balcony set at Frank

Lloyd Wrightrsquos Fallingwater and the story collection For Sale by

Owner She directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana Uni-

versity South Bend which is just a couple of hours from Limber-

lost Swamp seing of Gene Straon-Porterrsquos novel A Girl o he

Limberlos Although she is not from Indiana originally she could

probably say as her narrator does ldquoIrsquom from here nowrdquo

983109983140983159983137983154983140 983120983151983154983156983141983154

ldquoHoward Garfield Balladeerrdquo

Edward Porterrsquos short fiction has appeared in the Hudson Review

the Getysburg Review Colorado Review Barrelhouse Booh Bes

New American Voices and elsewhere He has been a Madison Fel-

low a MacDowell Fellow and a teaching fellow at Millsaps Col-lege and is currently a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University In

a former life as a touring actor he crisscrossed the Midwest and

spent many a golden evening drinking and swapping tales in Don

Hallrsquos Guesthouse in Fort Wayne Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 31: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3133

983090983090983089

983109983156983144983141983148 983122983151983144983137 983150

ldquoDark Starsrdquo

Ethel Rohan published her latest work in Te Lineup 983090983093 Provoca-ive Women Wriers (983090983088983089983093) Drivel Deliciously Bad Wriing by Your

Favorie Auhors (983090983088983089983092) and Flash Ficion Inernaional (983090983088983089983093) e

peony Indianarsquos state flower is a favorite Rohan is also ridicu-

lously partial to wine To find out more visit ethelrohancom

983126983137 983148 983141983154 983145 983141 983123983137983161 983141983154 983155

ldquoCleaning Lady to the Starsrdquo

Valerie Sayers Professor of English at the University of Notre

Dame has lived in Indiana since 98308910486331048633983091 a fact endlessly fascinating

to her old friends in Brooklyn She is the author of six novels as

well as many stories essays and reviews

983111983154983141983143 983123983139983144983159983145983152983152983155ldquoBurt Coble Catmanrdquo

Greg Schwipps was born and raised on a working farm in Milan

Indiana He co-authored Fishing for Dummies 983090nd Ediion and his

first novel Wha Tis River Keeps was reissued by Indiana Uni-

versity Press in 983090983088983089983090 In 983090983088983089983088 he won the Eugene amp Marilyn Glick

Indiana Authors Award in the Emerging Writer category Greg iscurrently an Associate Professor of English at DePauw University

He and his wife Alissa live with their two sons Milan and Arlo

in Wilbur Indiana

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 32: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3233

983090983090983090

983120983151983154983156983141983154 983123983144983154983141983158983141

ldquolsquoManchildrsquo Morrison e Best at Almost Wasrdquo

Porter Shreve is the author of four novels His latest Te End of he Book (983090983088983089983092) is partly inspired by Sherwood Andersonrsquos Winesburg

Ohio and takes place in both present-day and turn-of-the-century

Chicago Shreve directed the MFA Program at Purdue University

in West Lafayee Indiana for eight years He now teaches in the

low-residency MFA Program at Ashland University in Ohio and

in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco

983111983141983151983154983143983141 983123983145983150983143983148983141983156983151983150

ldquoGrudge Wrightrdquo

George Singleton is the author of six collections of stories two

novels and a book of writing advice He holds the John C Cobb

Chair in the Humanities at Wofford College in Spartanburg

South Carolina

983108983141983138 983119983148983145983150 983125983150 983142983141983154983156983144

ldquoDear Class of 983090983088983089983089rdquo

Deb Olin Unferth is the author most recently of the memoir

Revoluion finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award

and a New York imes Editorsrsquo Choice Her work has appeared inHarperrsquos the New York imes McSweeneyrsquos the Boson Review the

Believer Conjuncions and elsewhere She has received three Push-

cart Prizes and a Creative Capital Grant for Innovative Literature

She grew up in Chicago and spent her childhood running up and

down the Indiana sand dunes

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since

Page 33: Winesburg, Indiana (excerpt)

892019 Winesburg Indiana (excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwinesburg-indiana-excerpt 3333

983114983145 983149 983127983137 983148983147 983141

ldquoAcknowledgments by Marny Vanderroostrdquo

Jim Walke helps the Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech write very large biomedical research grant proposals e rest of

the time he works on a novel hikes with Rudyard Kiplingmdashhis

dog of dubious intelligencemdashand watches hockey His work has

appeared in several journals and anthologies including most re-

cently the Massachusets Review and Home of he Brave Somewhere

in he Sand On long drives to the South Jim splits Indiana length- wise on state highways and back roads rather than the soulless

expressway

Regardless of rivers crossed and boundaries on a map he al-

ways knows he has reached Indiana when a gas station aendant

or passerby makes a smartass cuing remark in the nicest possible

manner

983107983148983137983145 983154983141 983126983137983161983141 983127983137983156983147983145983150983155

ldquoMari Waitingrdquo

Claire Vaye Watkins a 983090983088983089983092 Guggenheim Fellow is the author

of the story collection Batleborn which won the Story Prize the

Dylan omas Prize the New York Public Library Young Lions

Fiction Award the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Leers and a Silver Pen Award

from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame As a girl she spent a sum-

mer in the rivers and swimming holes near Elkhart and has oen

returned to the Indiana of her imagination since