Description
From the acclaimed author of the international best seller Einstein’s Dreams, here
is a stunning, lyrical memoir of Memphis from the 1930s through the
1960s that includes the early days of the movies and a powerful
grandfather whose ghost remains an ever-present force in the lives of
his descendants.
Alan Lightman’s grandfather M.A. Lightman was
the family’s undisputed patriarch: it was his movie theater empire that
catapulted the Lightmans to prominence in the South, his fearless
success that both galvanized and paralyzed his children and
grandchildren. In this moving, impressionistic memoir, the author
chronicles his return to Memphis in an attempt to understand the origins
he so eagerly left behind forty years earlier. As aging uncles and
aunts begin telling family stories, Lightman rediscovers his southern
roots and slowly recognizes the errors in his perceptions of both his
grandfather and his father, who was himself crushed by M.A. The result
is an unforgettable family saga that extends from 1880 to the present,
set against a throbbing century of Memphis—the rhythm and blues, the
barbecue and pecan pie, the segregated society—and including personal
encounters with Elvis, Martin Luther King Jr., and E. H. “Boss” Crump.
At the heart of it all is a family haunted by the memory of its
domineering patriarch and the author’s struggle to understand his
conflicted loyalties.
Email or call for price.