Enough with “Mountain Man” Stereotypes: Leah Hampton Interviewed by Michelle Hogmire
On bifurcated character, wine socialists, plus the have to center feminist political ecology in discussions of latest Appalachia.
“Nothing’ll actually fix what’s broken in this community, it might be great if they’d no less than obtain the dead keep out from the parking area at delicacies Country.” Thus begins the concept tale of Leah Hampton’s debut collection F*ckface: And Other tales (Henry Holt & Co.)—a at the same time raucous and sobering glance at rural presence inside modern American South. The tenor of the beginning range, world-weary and wacky, characterizes Hampton’s prose: she mines the fractured scratch of field on area and affairs while still creating time for laughs. That humor might be how exactly we, and Hampton’s characters, survive.
These stories were populated by difficult staff and big dreamers, by students used at slaughterhouses, by a homosexual technical sergeant with bigoted moms and dads, by busted families of beekeepers, by a woman obsessed about the woman husband’s better friend—but a lot more deeply in love with the sparkle of Dolly Parton. As a West Virginia native (the sole county thought about Appalachian in totality), I sensed an intense link with the folks and mountains of F*ckface, and that I realized I’d to talk to mcdougal. Hampton is actually a graduate for the Michener Center for article authors, and she lives in the azure Ridge hills.
Michelle Hogmire I’m embarrassed to say that I became embarrassed of being from western Virginia for some time. Therefore thank you. For F*ckface. I’m getting all teary regarding it, but it’s severely just about the most precise and varied representations of Appalachia as well as the region’s working-class individuals that I’ve browse in quite a few years. Would you let me know regarding your credentials as well as your relationship to where you’re from?
Leah Hampton I’m truly, really glad your enjoyed the book, and that it talked to you personally as people from the region. That’s super vital that you me.
I’m sorts of a hybrid Appalachian, that I consider is actually perhaps why I’m currently talking about the area in a different way than what people frequently discover. My father try from Harlan region, Kentucky, and I was born in Charleston and possess stayed in western North Carolina essentially all my entire life. But my personal mommy was Uk, therefore I need twin citizenship and fork out a lot period offshore.
I ought to stop here and state this doesn’t create me personally want. My personal mother’s area can be like my dad’s—very working class, factory-floor socialist types. Folks inside my parents always worked, and I’m the very first person to finish college, write a book, etc. We frequently want to say I’m a bifurcated woman, half European inside my considering, half pissed-off hill girl. 1 / 2 contained in this Appalachian industry, and half out. I do believe that’s a good vantage aim that to write fiction. Particularly when you’re writing about somewhere that is as bittersweet, challenging, and storied because this area.
MH just what brought you to definitely compose these reports?
LH I wanted to write stories that challenging and feminized the Appalachia i am aware, and emphasized environmentally friendly problems in the region. We don’t talking adequate about how exactly masculine narratives and gazes control the representation within this location, or just how much of Appalachia is actually non-normative, non-white, non-whatever-people-think-it-is. Additionally, i desired to publish tales that juxtaposed wit and loss. Because personally, it is a location in which admiration and harm are incredibly really near along, everyday. Essentially, I’m an unusual and unique individual surviving in a weird and unique location. I desired to create the publication I couldn’t discover, write the stories I needed to see, regarding what it is enjoy residing right here.
My personal earliest job out of college or university had been doing work for Greenpeace, and I also did many eco-warrior information inside my youthfulness, therefore, the stories from inside the guide focus on the symbiosis between muscles and land. Permanently or sick, in Appalachia all of our experiences are intertwined with your ecosystem. We act upon the land—abusing, exploiting, removing, enjoying, cultivating, wishing. And, in turn, the secure serves upon all of us. That inextricability drives the plots and personal arcs of countless my personal figures. The epigraph for the book is actually a quote from Wendell Berry: “You cannot save your self the area apart from the folks, or even the men and women besides the land.” This is a manuscript filled up with everyone and areas who want save, and there are no easy solutions for almost any ones. I’m negative at solutions, therefore the guide does not truly supply any. Alternatively, i really hope it makes folks envision and discover some nuance where perhaps they haven’t prior to.
Lastly, we truly wouldn’t wish write a book about “old” Appalachia. That’s been finished, and completed attractively, thus there’s no point for me currently talking about the way-back or seated on granny’s deck. The tales is occur the final two decades approximately, in addition to figures has contemporary problems, modern-day feedback and tips. I hope I’ve represented the rural skills as maybe not an outdated or conventional one.