It’s Still All There
1st September 2021
On the way back to the Cities I thought of some writers who are perfectly empowered to discuss the fate and foibles of the Fargos of America, but would probably twitch in their seat if you drove them around, first out of fear that Red Indians would come whooping over the horizon, and then out of dismay that none of this comported with their preconceptions. There’s the classic movie theater, still open, all the marquee bulbs flashing. There’s where the symphony plays. There’s the museum. There’s the central library. There’s the coffee shop with the rainbow flag. There’s the 30s office building with Moderne lines; there’s the dense housing; there’s the bright new big school, lavishly funded. There’s the big newspaper building. There’s the University. Oh, look, there’s the other University. There’s the historic architecture. Here’s the river. Beyond all this, endless grain and toil.
That’s why there’s always a market, in the Big City, for a book by a Big City denizen (who, more often than not, didn’t grow up in the Big City) chronicling a down-the-Zambezi-with-gun-and-camera expedition to Flyover Country, marveling at all of the Dirt People and what strange shenanigans they get up to.