Outside Reading Set #4: Book Review

2/21/11

“Moving 'Beyond Katrina' Through Poetry And Prose”

W. Ralph Eubanks

Book Review

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129378912

In his book review of Natasha Trethewey’s Beyond Katrina: A Meditation on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, W. Ralph Eubanks takes a New Historical approach mixed in with some elements of Formalism. In particular, he emphasizes the background of the author, which he claims impacts the quality of the novel. Eubanks says that Trethewey “faces and confronts demons from her past and the present,” resulting in “a book as moving and compelling as Trethewey's poetry.” To support this statement, Eubanks uses powerful diction to drive his point home about the “compelling” nature of Trethewey’s book. His selection of the word “demons” paints an especially vivid image of Trethewey’s struggles, portraying how captivating her book is.

“What makes Beyond Katrina stand out in the crowded landscape of post-Katrina literature is the raw, personal nature of the story Trethewey tells, as well as the poetic language she uses to tell the tale” reiterates the emotional and personal value of Tretheway’s book. Here, Eubanks adds some elements of Formalism to his analysis. He comments on the “poetic language” Trethewey uses and praises the technique for adding to the compelling nature of the book. Another technique Eubanks himself uses to illustrate his point and to sell Trethewey’s book is abundant citation of details from the latter’s book. He repeatedly quotes Trethewey, often juxtaposing the quotations in such a way to portray the subject matter in its best light. By selectively picking out passages, Eubanks emphasizes the more beautiful aspects of the book.

Eubanks takes care to employ parallel structure when citing examples from Trethewey’s book to illustrate his point. This syntactical move bolsters the fluency of Eubanks’s own writing and also mirrors the flowing, poetic style he appreciates in Trethewey’s writing. To emphasize his points, Eubanks also uses unconventional sentence structures, such as placing conjunctions at the beginning of sentences: “And Trethewey's prose captures memory with poetic precision.” The abnormal construction of this sentence as well as its strategic placement at the end of the paragraph makes it stand out.

This piece reminds me of the forewords and introductions in the beginning of books, especially in classic literature. There, readers try to match what they know about the author to the events in the book. In particular, this reminds me of one analysis I read of Shakespeare’s background and how it applies to his work. The incorporation of the author’s background and personal qualities in this analysis is one of its greatest strengths. Normally, we are used to reading very formalistic approaches to critical analyses. Thus, it is nice to read a different approach for once. Although I like the approach, a possible weakness is the author’s lack of development in the formalistic approach. He could have supported his claim more; the review was particularly biased towards the new historical aspect of his analysis.