Blue Highways: A Journey Into America

Product Information

Entertainment & Arts Why L.A.’s beach ban hurts: The meaning of public spaces amid social distancing In discussing reading this book with other people, one person pointed out that what makes for interesting discovery-road-trip writings are when the character is forced to set out (I'm thinking the early parts of The Glass Castle), rather than "Look at me! I'm going on a journey! -and it's the journey not the destination!" I have spent a lot of time at the Monastery of the Holy Spirit myself,” I explained some more. “Many monks there were friends of mine, particularly 10 or 15 years ago. One of them, Father Anthony Delisi, you also quote by name in Blue Highways. He was a character. Sicilian. I was once involved in publishing a book of his about prayer. He’s also now gone. But I can easily imagine him answering your questions in the roundabout ways that Father Duffy did.” In the world we currently live in, of social media, 24-hour news cycles, and constructed culture wars, there’s a lot of talk over how far we should go in forgiving people for past mistakes. We all have friends and family that we love and that we also know have made mistakes before. If we’re honest with ourselves we know we’ve made mistakes too. This song was in part meant to be a reminder of that, and that we all deserve a second chance, another shot at leaving it all out on the line. The Blue Highways’ new album Out On The Line is out now and the band will be playing live shows in April and beyond. For dates and more, head over to thebluehighwaysband.com

I kept trying: “Have you returned to any reading of Merton, or authors like him, in the 40 years since Blue Highways?”Strade blu, per quanto può valere la mia opinione, è addirittura un capolavoro. 500 pagine di pura emozione e di vita distillata. Enfolded in keyboard swirls, ‘ Man With No Name’ is pure blue collar Bruce, again touching on the immigrant experience in the opening verse The World Almanac and Book of Facts 1985. New York: Newspaper Enterprise Association, Inc. 1984. p.415. ISBN 0-911818-71-5. I like the freedom I have with fiction” he says, “although I’m finding the kind of fiction I write requires almost as much research as my nonfiction did. That’s particularly true of ‘O America.’” I asked him: “We encounter American religion in many forms throughout Blue Highways. I realize you wrote about the people you met along the way, but you also must have been interested to meet and talk with those who exhibited a religious passion? You must have sought them out, right?”

The reason this is a problem is there is no other reason for Moon to be out where he is, having the conversations he's having other than for the purpose of the book.

Most popular

un libro che racconta un viaggio epocale: il protagonista perde tutto, amore, lavoro e decide di imbarcarsi in un viaggio attraverso le strade secondarie degli Stati Uniti, quelle che sono storicamente chiamate strade blu. In mezzo al trambusto della sua vita Heat-Moon si ritaglia il tempo per fare quella cosa che pochi sono capaci di fare: ascoltare. Ascolta le storie degli altri, si emoziona per i loro ricordi. A volte scatta istantanee di queste persone, che coi loro racconti rimettono in ordine i pezzi di puzzle confusi della sua vita. In recent years, Trogdon has turned to novel writing, also under the pen name Least Heat-Moon. But a traveler is a traveler, fiction or non. His second novel, “O America: Discovery in a New Land,” which came out this month, chronicles the journey of the fictional British Dr. William Trennant, who, in 1848, leaves England to see America’s new democracy in action and gauge its chance of success for himself.

Blue Highways: A Journey Into America was one of the truly extraordinary books of the late 20th century.

Create account

May I ask, then, where were you religiously when you were writing? And how would you describe where you are today?” Heat-Moon mentioned in Blue Highways that he had started and stopped reading Thomas Merton’s The Seven Storey Mountain. “I just recently published a short biography of Merton with St. Martin’s Press,” I said to him. “You began to read Merton’s autobiography again while staying at the monastery in Georgia. What was it about Merton that failed to catch your attention then?” Rio Grande’ brings piano into the mix for a midtempo widescreen ballad that, sung in the voice of a grieving wife and mother, sketches a Mexican tragedy but the line Those were the directions. I was looking for an unnumbered road, named after a nonexistent town, that would take me to a place called Nameless, that nobody was sure existed.” But you and Bakke share the hospitality of a stranger, in his home, the first night you’re together,” I said. “Bakke leads a kneeling prayer in the living room, and you describe, with embarrassment, losing your balance and falling over. You don’t mention any unwillingness to join in the prayer, however. Were you a willing participant?”

The author of this book is part poet and part philosopher and part Indian. I have liked this book just a little bit less each time I have read it and that is not to say anything against the author. When I first read it I could imagine myself going on his physical journey and I am sure at the time I wished I could do it. Now about 40 years after he wrote the book and not quite that long since I first read the book I have traveled my share of blue highways although most of them were not made of asphalt. I have now come to a time in my life where listening to this book brought an incredible number of memories to mind. I also wonder how many of these little towns and businesses still exist today and if they have been laid by the wayside by the various drug epidemics that have ravaged the rural U.S. since the 1980’s. Ralph Waldo Emerson advised that one should not go where the path may lead but instead should go where there is no path and leave a trail. The erstwhile Bill Trogdon, who transformed himself into William Least Heat-Moon in observation of his Native-American heritage did just that in his book, Blue Highways: A Journey Into America, using travel as a cleansing ritual after the breakup of his marriage & the loss of his college teaching position, always endeavoring to take the "roads less traveled by", as Robert Frost put it. Four Calendar Cafe: Blue Highways inspired the name of the Cocteau Twins' 1993 album, Four-Calendar Café. [6]An Osage Journey to Europe 1827-1830 (2013) was translated and edited by Least Heat-Moon and James K Wallace. It is the account of six Osage people who traveled to Europe in 1827, accompanied by three Americans. Every travel book is ultimately about the traveler. The act of being on the road — visiting unfamiliar places, interacting with strangers — helps to puts him in context. The journey becomes a mirror that reflects the traveler to himself, and to the readers of his travelogue. Whether or not a reader enjoys his book, therefore, hinges on whether the reader enjoys the author’s company.