Crossing Troublesome: 25 Years of the Appalachian Writers Workshop (review)

the reader is to make of Charlie's walking away from the gathering of Black men in one of the latter episodes Ashcom deliberately leaves ambiguous. Whether Charlie is abandoning the effort to walk the racial tightrope or whether he has been merely wounded again by Robert Paine's drunken rejection of him as a "White boy" is a key point in understanding where Charlie ultimately arrives on the question of race. Winter Run is a fine collection of much welcomed, wonderfully masculine stories. Ashcom is an expert craftsmanwho infuses his stories with empathy and pathos, but who exercises admirable control over the narrative. In addition to demonstrating a sensitivity to time and place, Ashcom brings the narrative to bear upon the ponderous questions and concerns of the region that shares so much in common with the rest of Southern Appalachia. To be sure, Ashcom's Virginia is a lost place in time, but its legacy is superbly captured in these excellent stories. —Warren J. Carson Leatha Kendrick and George Ella Lyon, Eds. Crossing Troublesome: 25 Years ofthe Appalachian Writers Workshop. Lexington, Kentucky: Wind Publications, 2002. 200 pages. Paperback. $18.00. Any discussion of Appalachian Literature will begin with, circle around, and end with the phrase, "a sense of place." It is from this sense of place that the editors of Crossing Troublesome chose to work. 83 For those unfamiliar with the Hindman Appalachian Writers Workshop, one must cross Troublesome Creek to get from downtown Hindman, Kentucky, to the campus of the Hindman Settlement School. One must also cross the footbridge across Troublesome to get from the main dining hall and the dormitories to workshops held in the James Still Building on that campus. The hand-drawn map giving driving directions that appears on the workshop brochure is also found on the title page of this book, but this spacial emphasis is elaborated upon by an additional map of the Hindman campus conceived especially for this writing collection. The editors divide the book according to places on the map and special landmarks in the history of the workshop. Past participants were invited to share their memories of the Writers Workshop, and what emerges is essentially a scrapbook of the experience. The snippets of stories, conversations and poems are exactly what a visitor on a walking tour of the campus might expect to hear: stories of dorm despair (there are plenty), washing dishes (everyone works), class notes, readings in the great hall, arrivals, departures, and singing on the hill. All blend into a long, lazy conversation. The landmarks are the late literary mothers and fathers of the workshop: Albert Stewart, Harriet Arnow, James Still, and Jim Wayne Miller. Just like at the workshop, well known authors rub elbows and are given equal space with teachers, coal miners, chemists, and farmers. A participant washes dishes with Lee Smith, Robert Morgan, or Sharyn McCrumb. It is fitting that the writings all blend as one, almost in a stream of consciousness, for the week often passes that way. Just as participants mingle well with established writers, so does their writing. The participant readings always produce stunning moments. Similarly, the participant writings in Crossing Troublesome are also very good and more than up to inclusion with those of the former staff members. These little essays and poems give very much a sense of the culture and place of the workshop. The poetic tributes to Albert Stewart, Jim Wayne Miller, and James Still are particularly poignant. Mr. Still and Mr. Stewart passed away within weeks of each other in 2001. Their deaths were still much on the minds of many of the authors. The passing of Harriette Arnow in 1986 and Miller in 1996 left large gaps in the heart of the workshop. Crossing Troublesome feels like a scrapbook or a writer's journal. Participant Ann Olson says, "... don't call this anthology just a book!" (182) It isn't. The anthology "... stirs what lies in the satchels of memory" (Jeff Daniel Marion 110). Utilizing sense of place, the editors 84 take us on a walking tour past twenty-five years of landmarks, people, memories, and musings and give the reader some sense of this special...