Escape Velocity

A Charles Portis Miscellany

De: Charles Portis, Jay Jennings - editor

Narrado por: Susan Bennett, T. Ryder Smith

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.

©2013 Charles Portis; Compilation (c)2012 The Butler Center for Arkansas Studies; Introduction (c)2012 Jay Jennings (P)2022 Recorded Books

"today I'm changing the oil in my truck"

I was in the fiction aisle of the library, looking for P.G Wodehouse in the wrong place. I saw" Gringos" by Charles Portis and something clicked. I turned immediately to the first line of Ch. 1 to see how this author gets started. I thought, "This is good", then "Good grief, this is really good!"
I then found myself getting on the elevator, reading all along, heading for the loneliest spot in the entire library. I found a 3rd floor carol so far removed no one could possibly disturb me. I sat there for 3 hours, engrossed, yet disbelieving just how brilliant the writing was. My reading changed that day. I become a Portis devotee and a bore and I didn't care. Most other writing is just "foul grunting" and that is all there is to it.
This wonderful collection fills in so much of Portis' career and personal character. It is indispensable.