{"product_id":"escape-velocity-a-charles-portis-miscellany-9781945624261","title":"Escape Velocity: A Charles Portis Miscellany","description":"\u003cp\u003eFor those who care about literature or simply love a good laugh (or both), Charles Portis has long been one of America's most admired novelists. His 1968 novel \u003ci\u003eTrue Grit\u003c\/i\u003e is fixed in the contemporary canon, and four more have been hailed as comic masterpieces. For the first time, his other writings--journalism, travel stories, short fiction, memoir, and even a play--were brought together in \u003ci\u003eEscape Velocity: A Charles Portis Miscellany\u003c\/i\u003e, published in 2012 as his first new book in more than twenty years. This revised edition includes a new afterword by best-selling author Donna Tartt, who first published her remembrance in the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times \u003c\/i\u003efollowing Portis's death in 2020.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll the familiar Portis elements are in this collection: picaresque adventures, deadpan humor, an expert eye for detail and keen ear for the spoken word, and encounters with oddball characters both real and imagined. The collection encompasses the breadth of his fifty-year writing career, from his gripping reportage of the civil rights movement for the \u003ci\u003eNew York Herald Tribune\u003c\/i\u003e to a comic short story about the demise of journalism in the twenty-first century. His three-act play, \u003ci\u003eDelray's New Moon\u003c\/i\u003e, was performed onstage in 1996 and published in \u003ci\u003eEscape Velocity\u003c\/i\u003e for the first time.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhether this is your first journey to the world of Portis or a long-awaited return to it, you'll agree with critic Ron Rosenbaum--whose essay appears here alongside tributes by other writers--that Portis \"will come to be regarded as the author of classics on the order of a twentieth-century Mark Twain, a writer who captures the soul of America.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Butler Center for Arkansas Studies\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 08\/31\/2021\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781945624261\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 376","brand":"Charles Portis","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":40649265971381,"sku":"9781945624261","price":29.71,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0473\/0804\/6492\/products\/img_baa6f3b6-e59c-4b2f-85b9-87ca3719d55f.jpg?v=1627964882","url":"https:\/\/pastforward.org\/products\/escape-velocity-a-charles-portis-miscellany-9781945624261","provider":"Past Forward","version":"1.0","type":"link"}