Fred Chapell: N.C. literature's grand old man

By D.G. Martin

For the Salisbury Post

Now that Reynolds Price is gone, who is the “grand old man” of North Carolina literature?

My candidate is Fred Chappell. If you have not made up your mind, watch him on UNC-TV’s “North Carolina Bookwatch” this afternoon at 5 p.m. and decide for yourself.

Just in case you have other obligations or someone in your family makes you watch the NFL championship games this afternoon, here are a few things that show Chappell’s importance to North Carolina writing.

Chappell is a former poet laureate of North Carolina. But fine poetry is just one of his gifts to us. Columnist, essayist, critic and writer of compelling fiction, many major prizes have come his way, including the Bollingen Prize in Poetry from Yale University, the Award in Literature from the National Institute of Arts and Letters, and, more recently, the North Carolina Humanities Council’s Caldwell Award.

His greatest legacy might be the large group of writers he inspired while teaching writing at UNC-Greensboro. He shows sometimes as a crusty old mountain man, careful and terse sometimes with his comments. His students say that his brief comments on their work were almost always on target and, though sometimes pain-provoking, important in bringing out their talents.

Those who are able to watch him this afternoon will see that his modest wisdom will show through his careful mountain manner.

Chappell grew up in Canton, where his father sold furniture. While his interests are world-wide, the mountains are still where he is most at home.

Today he will discuss his recent book of short fiction “Ancestors and Others: New and Selected Stories,” stories that take his readers all over the world and then back to North Carolina and people like folks we know and whose problems are familiar to us. (Editor’s note: The book was reviewed here Nov. 3, 2009 http://www.salisburypost. com/Entertainment/110109-book-chappell)

The new book collects a variety of 21 stories — mostly previously published. “Variety” is an insufficient description of the different experiences that Chappell gives his readers, taking them from the North Carolina mountains of the recent past to Sweden, France and England centuries ago; from North Carolina’s “good old boys” to the composer Haydn; from Newton’s theories to how to kill a deer.

Each story calls out to special audiences.

Every hunter would enjoy “Tradition,” which takes its hero from his group into a deer blind so cold, as described by Chappell, that this reader started to shake.

For serious gardeners, “Linnaeus Forgets” is perfect. Chappell takes us to Sweden in 1758 where Carl Linnaeus, the designer of plant classification systems, discovers a plant that houses a community of thousands of tiny human-like creatures.

Students of the Bible would be challenged by Chappell’s short, short story, “Judas,” in which Judas says that Jesus was “simply goofy, a nut…. That was the whole trouble, you know. His kind of Madness is contagious.”

Music lovers would like “Moments of Light,” in which Haydn’s visit to an observatory led to the composition of “The Creation.”

The despair that follows the loss of a best friend in a deadly accident as described in “Duet” would resonant with anyone who has ever suddenly lost a dear friend.

The appearance of three genetically reconstructed Civil War soldiers in “Ancestors” would entertain any modern Civil War enthusiast.

Any lover of books can identify with the librarian in “The Lodger.” A dead poet tries to infiltrate and take over the librarian’s life.

Those of us who grew up in small towns will remember events like the furniture store delivery team hauling a new freezer, the surprise “Christmas Gift” for a farmer’s wife.

Such stories are gifts to us, told in the “poetic prose” of a master storywriter, and the gifts will be enhanced by Chappell’s discussion of them this afternoon. See then if you agree that he is the new “grand old man” of North Carolina literature.

“Bookwatch” next week

Next week’s (Jan. 29) guest is Kathy Pories, series editor of “New Stories from the South.”

Pories, senior editor at Algonquin Books, is the series editor of “New Stories from the South,” an annual collection of the best short fiction in our region. Reading this collection of authors like Lee Smith and Jill McCorkle is a great way to sample the best of today’s important Southern fiction writers. On “Bookwatch,” Pories answers questions like “What sets Southern literary writers apart from other American writers?” and “What makes a short story different from a short novel?”

D.G. Martin hosts UNC-TV’s “North Carolina Bookwatch,” which airs Sundays at 5 p.m. For more information or to view prior programs visit the webpage at www.unctv.org/ncbookwatch/