"A newborn appeared city is the devil talking, Mom has walnut. "
Thus began the life of Early Taggart, in a godforsaken corner of West Virginia in 1903. A mother who thinks she has lit birth to a demon and decides to christen the middle of winter in the waters of a river jelly. The baby is doing miraculously but he will keep forever the stigma of this act of abuse. Indeed, following this awful plunge, the baby is developing a major infection in the mouth and gums which earned him the nickname of Maw-Trench. When his mother is arrested and detained, the child is collected by a slurry of raw and grew up in a house nestled in the foothills. Soon, he developed special gifts for climbing and the handling of the frond. As an adolescent, he engages with unions in the mining region in the conflict between workers and bosses. His talents as a sharpshooter make him a murderer who, to escape prosecution, going into hiding for 25 years in the mountains.
Between 1946 and 1961, returned to civilization, Maw-Trench bluesman then successively became a journalist, covering in particular the election of Kennedy in his native region. Then it was back to the wild for nearly 30 years until the early 90 ...
Where to begin to introduce you The Ballad of-Mouth Trench ? Perhaps the small end of the telescope with the translator's name. This is Brice Mathieussent, which for me is already a sign of quality. The gentleman is in effect, among others, the translator of John Fante, which really is not anything. But hey, fortunately, the novel is not limited to the excellence of his translation. Early Life Taggart is to American literature pure sugar, full of breath and energy. The writing is fluid, dialogues carvings, accurate descriptions, gallery of unforgettable characters, in short all the ingredients to make this text a little gem.
course, the author makes too much with this centenary able to live completely alone in a shack mountainside. But we fooled with delight by the side most improbable situations because it feels good to read in 2011 a picaresque tale starring a hero worthy of the greatest literary figures made in the USA. One thinks of Ignatius Reilly, JK Toole, the Bandini J. Fante or the Edgar Mint by Brady Udall.
Realize, The Ballad of-Mouth trench is a first novel! Far, very far from the French auto-fiction where the authors spend their time looking at each bullet hole, it is good to find an author able to rein to reveal great storytelling skills. I really hope that Glenn Taylor will meet the success it deserves.
The Ballad of Maw-trench , Glenn Taylor, Grasset, 2011. 348 pages. 20 euros.
The more info : I take this post to formally announce my participation in the challenge of Nature Writing Folfaerie . For me, much of the novel is Nature Writing, including periods where trench-mouth lives alone in the mountains for several decades. And then the story that crosses the 20th century, discusses the issue of exploitation of mineral resources of West Virginia that led to the leveling of mountains to allow the creation of open pits, which has disfigured the landscape and caused the disappearance of much of the fauna and flora. In short, the Ballad of Maw-trench may well be part of the tradition of nature writing though is not limited to this. He will represent in any case my first participation in the challenge Folfaerie.
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