..."this impressive collection of essays provides an important, though too long neglected, part of American literary history. This book effectively gives Appalachian literature the serious attention it deserves." ----Sandra L. Ballard, editor of Appalachian Journal and Listen Here: Women Writing in Appalachia ****An American Vein: Critical Readings in Appalachian Literature is an anthology of literary criticism of Appalachian novelists, poets, and playwrights. The book reprises critical writing of influential authors such as Joyce Carol Oates, Cratis Williams, and Jim Wayne Miller. It introduces new writing by Rodger Cunningham, Elizabeth Engelhardt, and others. Many writers from the mountains have found success and acclaim outside the region, but the region itself as a thriving center of literary creativity has not been widely appreciated. The editors of An American Vein have remedied this, producing the first general collection of Appalachian literary criticism. This book is a resource for those who teach and read Appalachian literature. What's more, it holds the promise of introducing new readers, nationally and internationally, to Appalachian literature and its relevance to our times. ****ABOUT THE EDITORS----Danny L. Miller is the chair of the Department of Literature and Language at Northern Kentucky University. He is the author of Wingless Flights: Appalachian Women in Fiction. Sharon Hatfield is an independent writer and editor whose interests include Appalachian history, literature, and media. Her book Never Seen the Moon: The Trials of Edith Maxwell is forthcoming from University of Illinois Press. Guerney Norman is a novelist and short story writer. He is the director of thecreative writing program at the University of Kentucky. His books include the short story collection Kinfolks: The Wilgus Stories. He coedited Backtalk: Stories from an American Region.

An original novella-length folktale by former Kentucky Poet Laureate Gurney Norman. The book includes the original tale, four essays about the story, and an afterword by the author.

Appalachia has long been stereotyped as a region of feuds, moonshine stills, mine wars, environmental destruction, joblessness, and hopelessness. Robert Schenkkan's 1992 Pulitzer-Prize winning play The Kentucky Cycle once again adopted these stereotypes, recasting the American myth as a story of repeated failure and poverty--the failure of the American spirit and the poverty of the American soul. Dismayed by national critics' lack of attention to the negative depictions of mountain people in the play, a group of Appalachian scholars rallied against the stereotypical representations of the region's people. In Back Talk from Appalachia, these writers talk back to the American mainstream, confronting head-on those who view their home region one-dimensionally. The essays, written by historians, literary scholars, sociologists, creative writers, and activists, provide a variety of responses. Some examine the sources of Appalachian mythology in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century literature. Others reveal personal experiences and examples of grassroots activism that confound and contradict accepted images of ""hillbillies."" The volume ends with a series of critiques aimed directly at The Kentucky Cycle and similar contemporary works that highlight the sociological, political, and cultural assumptions about Appalachia fueling today's false stereotypes.