Spoon Theory
Morgan DePue on how good memories, childhood trauma, and chronic pain can all rest in the hollow of that wooden spoon you hold in your hand.
Stories
Let It Be Declared
From South Carolina to Washington, D.C., a chronicle of poetic lineage and family history.
By Brian Gilmore /
What We Love, What We Become
Illumination can spring from anywhere: the beach, our vices, or the sacred tomato sandwich.
By Paul Jones /
Under the Tree of Forgiveness
An early excerpt from the upcoming book “Prine on Prine”—one of John Prine’s final interviews, with the man who produced his final album.
By Holly Gleason and Dave Cobb /
The Kindness of Strangers
Playwright Tennessee Williams was born in Mississippi and raised in the almost-South of Missouri. But no writer is more indelibly associated with the Big Easy.
By Rob Rushin-Knopf /
We’ll Get By
Two poems that take an unflinching look inside a struggling family in Southern Appalachia.
By Becky Parker /
Oh, Holly
Salvation South offers its gratitude to one of America’s greatest music writers, who keeps coming back to our pages.
By Chuck Reece /
The Last Man Standing
The new Blind Boys of Alabama album marks the final song from Jimmy Carter, who was there eight decades ago, when it all began.
By Chuck Reece and Photographs by Lynsey Weatherspoon /
Bluegrass State Blues
Nat Myers’s sound is reminiscent of Charley Patton and Memphis Minnie, but his perspective as a first-generation Korean-American raised in Kentucky brings a fresh twist to the fingerstyle blues tradition.
By Rob Rushin-Knopf /
Balms in the Woods
In summer’s dreadful heat, unfulfilled threats of rain and unfulfilled desires in our chests leave us wanting.
By KB Ballentine /
Our Other Important Jimmy Carter
A few words about my long talk with the leader of the Blind Boys of Alabama.
By Chuck Reece /
The Persistence of Memory
It’s the title of a Salvador Dali painting, yes, but it’s also a uniquely Southern affliction.