Escape Velocity, Charles Portis
Escape Velocity, Charles Portis
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Escape Velocity
A Charles Portis Miscellany

Author: Charles Portis, Jay Jennings

Narrator: Susan Bennett, T. Ryder Smith

Unabridged: 14 hr 3 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 05/03/2022

Synopsis

Best known for his glorious comic novels—including the American classic True Grit—Charles Portis was also a prolific essayist, travel writer, and newspaper reporter. Now, for the first time, these writings—journalism, short fiction,
memoir, travel stories, and even a play—have been brought together in Escape Velocity: A Charles Portis Miscellany. The collection encompasses the breadth of Portis’s fifty-year writing career, covering topics as varied as road tripping in Baja,
Elvis’s visits to his aging mother, and his own boyhood in Arkansas. Also included in Escape Velocity are Portis’s three-act play Delray’s New Moon, “Damn!” a rare short story from 1957, and tributes by Donna Tartt, Wells Tower, Ron Rosenbaum,
Ed Park, and Roy Blount Jr. While fans of Charles Portis’s sly and distinctive humor, quirky characters, and keen ear for detail will be thrilled at this new addition to their libraries, Escape Velocity will also serve as an essential introduction to those not yet familiar with his work.

About Charles Portis

Charles Portis (1933–2020) was an American author best known for his classic Western True Grit and the novel Norwood, both of which were made into major motion pictures. He served in the US Marine Corps during the Korean War and then attended the University of Arkansas. As a reporter, he wrote for the New York Herald Tribune and was also its London bureau chief. His first novel, Norwood, was published in 1966 and True Grit in 1968. His other novels include Masters of Atlantis, The Dog of the South, and Gringos.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Aaron

Anyone who would consider picking this "miscellany" up is almost by definition a Portis die-hard already, but although it wouldn't make a very good introduction to his work for a newbie, it's still worth a read if you've already plowed through all five of his novels. According to the Introduction, t......more

Goodreads review by Patrick

Escape Velocity: A Charles Portis Miscellany (2012) edited by Jay Jennings might only be of interest to those of what Ron Rosenbaum calls, from his essay included in the appendix "Our Least-Known Great Novelist," the Society of Portis. This and two other seminal essays, Roy Blount Jr.'s "Comedy in E......more

Goodreads review by Michael

There is no one like Charles Portis in American letters. He wrote five novels, all of which are revered in different orders of preference by his ardent fans. Perhaps a main reason for this is simply that they are funny. Not just funny, as in amusing, but laugh out loud funny. I say this obviously as......more

Goodreads review by Bro_Pair أعرف

This is it - this is the guy to beat. The peerless writer. The Bard of Little Rock. His reportage on the murder of Medgar Evers, the beautiful, possibly neo-Confederate "Combinations of Jacksons," the travel stories through Baja California and America's motels. You fools who would anoint people like......more

Goodreads review by Larry

Having recently completed Dog of the South ( a great novel) in which the story’s narrator Ray Midge concludes, upon his return home, that many are unable to achieve the exit velocity necessary -not to come back. Which, of course, has led me to Exit Velocity, Jay Jennings’ compendium of Portis materi......more

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