Let Me Lie - Being in the Main an Ethnological Account of the Remarkable Commonwealth of Virginia and the Making of Its History (Paperback, Univ PR of Virginia ed.)

Mellowed, lightly amusing, regional and historical essay- and assaying, as he contributes various criticisms, literary and historical, along his peculiar lines of research. These are freehand improvisations on themes, and carry on Cabell's public controversies, his polished argument, his love of his native state. He vindicates the characters in The First Gentleman of America and other books; he has imaginary conversations with and letters to Virginia characters of book and history; he defends the lengths to which Virginia history goes in assembling myths; he records youthful memories of elders' conversations on Lincoln, carpetbaggers, the War Between the States; he discusses the place of The Reviewer in the literary scene of the 'o's; he includes his articles on Ellen Glasgow; he writes of his life in Virginia's Northern Neck. For the literary essay market. (Kirkus Reviews)

When "Let Me Lie" was first published in 1947, most reviewers missed the double meaning of the book's title. Deaf to James Branch Cabell's many-layered ironic wit, they read the book as a paean to the old South.

Readers of this new paperback edition are unlikely to repeat the mistake. "Let Me Lie" is indeed a carefully researched and brilliantly written historical narrative of Virginia from 1559 to 1946--focusing on Tidewater, Richmond, and the Northern Neck--but as a fictional scholar remarks in the book, Cabell's history is "both accurate and injudicious." Virginia's story of itself, Cabell claims, depends on illusion and myth, and his skill as a satirist allows him to construct and deflate these myths simultaneously. Ranging from Don Luis de Velasco and Captain John Smith to Edgar Allan Poe and Ellen Glasgow, from Confederate heroes to the oddities of the post-Civil War Old Dominion, "Let Me Lie" remains compulsively readable, as history, entertainment, or both.

General

Imprint:	University of Virginia Press
Country of origin:	United States
Series:	The Virginia Bookshelf
Release date:	April 2001
First published:	April 2001
Authors:	James Branch Cabell
Foreword by:	R.H.W. Dillard
Dimensions:	203 x 133 x 22mm (L x W x T)
Format:	Paperback
Pages:	312
Edition:	Univ PR of Virginia ed.
ISBN-13:	978-0-8139-2043-6
Categories:	Books > Humanities > History > American history > General Books > History > American history > General
LSN:	0-8139-2043-4
Barcode:	9780813920436

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