Farewell, I'm Bound to Leave You
Books / Hardcover
Books › Fiction › Short Stories (single author)
ISBN: 0312146000 / Publisher: Picador USA, September 1996
As Jess Kirkman's grandmother lies dying, he begins to recall the stories she and his mother have passed on to him--"Fisherwoman" and "Traveling Woman," "Silent Woman" and "Feistiest woman"--offering a chorus of women's voices that helped shape his youth and his preparation to become a man
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Farewell, I'm Bound to Leave You begins in a room made cool by the approach of death, where an old woman and her grieving daughter are saying good-bye in silent, urgent conversation. In the next room, Jess Kirkman waits with his father, remembering the tales his grandmother and mother have passed down - an inheritance rich in language and music and imaginative teaching, told by women to a young man who will one day find such wisdom needful.Each tale builds and weaves in a counterplay as intricate as that of fiddle and banjo. Jess recalls "The Fisherwoman," "The Traveling Woman," "The Feistiest Woman," "The Silent Woman," "The Wind Woman," and others, in a range of ghost to detective to comic to love stories. As he tells, he comes to understand the special knowledge of the women and the place that made him: a mountain land where myth becomes history, language makes song, and time seems to pause at a certain point at dusk, when the moon casts deeper shadows than the sun.
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