The Books of the States: Texas (34 electoral votes; Guest: Cristina Henríquez)
"Texas. You Have No Idea What You're Getting Yourself Into." That was the tagline to a TV commercial Cristina Henríquez saw in Iowa just before she set out to move to the Lone Star State. And she may have had the same reaction once she realized what she had taken on in agreeing to make our guest nominations for the 34 books to represent the once (and future?) Republic of Texas. But dive in she did, and with the help of some Texan friends, she ended up at the point I reach with almost every state I do, large or small: how do you choose only 34 books?
Henríquez had already lived in Delaware, Florida, Virginia, Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa by the time she made it to Texas, and has since returned to Illinois, but her fiction has mostly been about Panamá, the country of her father. The stories in her first collection, Come Together, Fall Apart, which led Booklist to compare her to Junot Díaz and Daniel Alarcón, are mostly set there, and in her debut novel, The World in Half, which comes out in April, a young American woman goes there in search of the father she never met. As it happens, a few years ago she wrote for Maud Newton about why she writes about Panamá: "I’m so busy living my life in the United States that I hardly see what’s here. I hardly notice things around me that might spark my imagination. By contrast, when I visit Panamá, my awareness of everything is heightened because I’m only in the country for at most two weeks each year."
She likely felt the same way as an outsider in Texas, and you can see the fruits of her observations in her essay on the state for State by State. I'm going to quote my favorite section here, about interviewing for a job at a Dallas magazine, even though it's long--because it's the Web and I can, and because this post is going to be a doozy already:
Then, as I was about to leave, he said, "So you made it here OK?"
Oh, sure, I told him, I just took the bus.
He blanched. "What are you doing taking the bus?"
"I don't have a car yet, but I used to live in Chicago and took public transportation all the time."
"You shouldn't be taking the bus," he said. "I don't like the idea of it."
"Really, I don't mind."
He looked alarmed, though, and after another second, called his current assistant into the room. He mumbled something to her, and she left, only to return a few minutes later with a set of keys, which he promptly handed to me.
"Here," he said. "Now you have a car. You can drive it until you get one of your own."
Then he turned to walk out of the room, while I stood there dumbfounded. He looked back, as if it had just occurred to him to ask, "You have insurance, right?"
"You know," I stammered, "I don't really feel comfortable--"
"Don't worry about it. No employee of mine will ride the bus."
"But I don't--"
"Come on. I'll walk you down to the parking garage so we can find it."
I realized that he was not going to let me leave the building without that car. So I nodded and followed him to a teal Mercury Sable parked in the first space by the elevator. He unlocked it and, like a Texas gentleman, opened the door for me. Then he gave me back the keys and told me to keep it for as long as I need, until I got my own car. As I pulled out of the garage, I could see him in the rearview mirror giving me a double-fisted thumbs-up and smiling so big his cheeks pushed up his glasses.
Those cheeks! That's what seals the deal on the story for me.
Here's her Texas 34, with her own introduction:
As if it weren’t intimidating enough writing an essay about Texas, I've now been assigned the task of choosing 34 (34!) books that represent this huge, vainglorious, multi-faceted state. Because there were so many slots to fill and I lived there for a scant three years, I polled some of my Texas-born-and-bred friends for their suggestions, too. In most cases, I got back long and enthusiastic lists that attest to just how much literary culture there really is in the Lone Star State; it blooms as freely and as rapaciously and as terrifically as the native bluebonnets that blanket the land each spring. Herewith, in no particular order, 34 (34!) books that either grew out of Texas or help define it.
- Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry: What would Texas literature be without Larry McMurtry? He is the quintessential Texas writer and this perhaps is the quintessential Texas book. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1986.
- The Last Picture Show by Larry McMurtry
- All My Friends Are Going to Be Strangers by Larry McMurtry
- All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy: Just as you can't compile a list of Texas books that doesn't include Larry McMurtry, it would be impossible to leave out Cormac McCarthy and his austere yet majestic novels.
- Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy
- The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros: One of the grand dames not only of Chicana literature, but of American literature. This is a book that deserves to be read for centuries, and it likely will be. Cisneros, incidentally, lives in a bright purple house on a San Antonio street.
- Hairs = Pelitos by Sandra Cisneros: A children's book that grew out of the above collection. It’s bilingual, which strikes me as very Texas, and it's wonderfully poetic, which strikes me as very Cisneros.
- The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter by Katherine Anne Porter
- Pale Horse, Pale Rider by Katherine Anne Porter: A series of three short novels, the title piece is a devastating account of the 1918 influenza outbreak. It was inspired by Porter’s own experiences of the illness.
- In the American West by Richard Avedon and Laura Wilson
This series of portraits by Avedon features everyone from the co-presidents of the Loretta Lynn Fan Club, to oil field workers, to a grave digger in the western United States. Beyond the photography itself, which is magnificent and stirring, I chose this book because the work was commissioned by none other than the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, Texas. - Donald Judd: Architecture in Marfa, Texas by Urs Peter Flückiger
These days, no discussion of Texas would be complete without including Marfa, one of the artiest places in the country. Donald Judd, and his outsized work, was the chief artist who made it so. - The House of Breath by William Goyen: I first read this in college, before I knew anything about Goyen's associations with Texas (he was born in Trinity and grew up in Houston) and it knocked me off kilter in the best possible way. Goyen once said, "I don't think anyone should write like me," and boy, no one does.
- Giant by Edna Ferber: A classic Texas book that inspired the equally classic film.
- The Liars' Club by Mary Karr: The bestselling memoir about Karr's tumultuous childhood in East Texas.
- Friday Night Lights by H.G. Bissinger: It gave rise to the movie adaptation and to the television program, but there's nothing that compares with the original book, which brings to light (brings to Friday Night Light?) Texans' ferocious obsession with high school football.
- The Path to Power (The Years of Lyndon Johnson, Volume 1) by Robert Caro
- Means of Ascent (The Years of Lyndon Johnson, Volume 2) by Robert Caro
- Master of the Senate (The Years of Lyndon Johnson, Volume 3) by Robert Caro: These biographies of the consummate Texas politician, Lyndon B. Johnson, are a towering achievement of scholarship. Between the three, they've won two National Book Critics Circle Awards, a National Book Award, and a Pulitzer Prize. Caro is at work on volume 4.
- The Gay Place by Billy Lee Brammer: On the heels of Caro, another selection about LBJ (this time in the form of a novel) as well as Austin politics.
- Guide to Life and Literature of the Southwest by J. Frank Dobie: A list within a list! Dobie is a nearly mythical name within the Texas literary scene. This is a compendium of writing about the Southwest that Dobie considered "good reading."
- Shrub: The Short but Happy Political Life of George W. Bush by Molly Ivins and Lou Dubose
I think it's fair to say there would be no George W. Bush if it weren’t for Texas. This is the story of the 43rd president before he got to Washington. - Splendor in the Short Grass: The Grover Lewis Reader by Grover Lewis: If you've never heard of Grover Lewis, nor read his pieces about popular culture and counterculture in the 60s and 70s, you're missing something great. And the Texas hook? Newsweek said it best: "His searing memoir of his white-trash Texas parents, who died in what was ruled a double suicide.... is a terse masterpiece."
- New Tastes from Texas by Stephen Pyles: Dallas supposedly has more restaurants per capita than New York City. That's the lore, anyway. All I know is that I ate more outstanding food in Dallas than I ever have anywhere. Flip through this book to find out why.
- Dominion of Lights by Isabel Nathaniel: A gorgeous collection of poetry.
- Brief Encounters with Che Guevara by Ben Fountain: Although the stories in this finely tuned collection have a worldly focus, Fountain is a long-time resident of Dallas, and the city has found its way into his soul: Rumor has it his next book will be all about the Big D.
- The Magic of Blood by Dagoberto Gilb: A vital and passionate book of short stories about Mexicans in Texas.
- Brownsville by Oscar Casares: A collection of short stories set in Brownsville, Texas
- Corpus Christi by Bret Anthony Johnston: A collection of short stories set in ... can you guess? Corpus Christi!
- 60 Stories by Donald Barthleme: Does he have a particularly Texas sensibility? I don't know. But Barthleme was born in Houston and taught in the MFA program at the University of Houston for years, so his connections to the state run deep, and that was good enough for me to include him on this list. "The School" is one of my all-time favorite short stories.
- The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien: This one might be a stretch, but O'Brien does teach at Texas State University-San Marcos. Besides, it seems appropriate to include a book about war since, in recent years Texas has sent more Army National Guard soldiers on Iraq or Afghanistan-related deployments than any other state.
- The Kind of Light That Shines on Texas by Reginald McKnight: A collection of short stories about the black American experience. I have the title story on tape and remember very acutely driving around Dallas and having to pull over in a parking lot on Cedar Springs Avenue to listen to the end.
- Sweetbitter by Reginald Gibbons: A novel about a different sort of Texas racial tension--that between whites and Native Americans.
- Kid B by Linden Dalecki: A young adult novel about a boy from Beaumont, TX, who breakdances. This book is all the rage with school-aged kids in the state.
- This Is Texas by Miroslav Sasek: Part of a series of children's books that takes kids everywhere from Paris to Hong Kong. This is the Texas portion of the itinerary. Beautiful illustrations.
- See all of our state posts
- Read our introduction to The Books of the States: 50 States, 538 Books
- Read our interview with State by State editors Matt Weiland and Sean Wilsey
Beth Fehlbaum on November 17, 2008 at 09:19 PM
As a native Texan and Texas author myself, this list makes me proud of my state for a whole new reason. :) Thanks!
Beth Fehlbaum, author
Courage in Patience, a story of hope for those who have endured abuse
http://courageinpatience.blogspot.com
Ch. 1 is online!
Miron Lovric on November 17, 2008 at 09:34 PM
All those books sound very interesting indeed to me, but what I'm
reading right now is LORD OF THE RINGS, The Return Of The King. It's
part three and believe me, it is very heavy reading by I love it.
Miron Lovric, 18/11/2008.
mllovric@gmail.com
aging lit major on November 18, 2008 at 05:04 AM
Good job! You've convinced me to finally read Porter.
Matt D on November 24, 2008 at 01:35 PM
The problem with this list, and with Ms. Henríquez's essay in "State by State," is one and the same - she wasn't a Texan long enough to warrant issuing a definitive opinion on the state. I mean, for several of her selections, it seems like she simply Googled "short story selection" and "NAME OF CITY" in order to have her geographical bases covered. She's a great writer, but I think someone else - someone with more knowledge basis - should have been chosen to write this list.
allpoints on March 02, 2009 at 06:45 PM
Austin isn't represented. That might be a good thing, considering that is usually gets more attention than all of the rest of Texas.
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