美国国家公共电台 NPR 'The Line That Held Us': Noir In Appalachia

 

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST:

David Joy's new novel begins with a terrible accident. Darl Moody¹ is looking to poach a deer in the woods when he accidentally kills another man, Carol Brewer², who is poaching himself rooting around for ginseng. That shooting leads to a cover-up that spins out of control. Along the way, we learn about the struggles of life in rural Appalachia. And we meet a fascinating and ferocious³ character Dwayne Brewer, a giant of a man who will not rest until his brother Carol's death is avenged⁴. David Joy's book is called "The Line That Held Us." And he joins us now from Blue Ridge⁵ Public Radio in Asheville, N.C. Welcome back to the program.

DAVID JOY: Yeah. Thanks for having me again.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: This world is so vivid. It's populated by people who are living on the margins⁶. Tell us about the characters we first meet, Darl Moody, who accidentally shoots Carol Brewer.

JOY: Yeah. Darl Moody and Carol Brewer are both, you know, working-class, rural people who are just kind of doing what they have to do to survive. Darl Moody's coming out of a family. His father's gone. And he very much feels a responsibility to take care of not only his mother but to take care of his sister and her children, as well.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: This is a world where family and friends are deeply important, which is how Darl Moody's best friend Calvin Hooper gets pulled in to help hide the killing⁷. And Calvin's sort of torn about what he should do.

JOY: One thing that's kind of indicative of this area is that people are still very much rooted to family and rooted to place. And so this is not just your everyday friendship. This is very much - it might as well be his sibling⁸. It might as well be blood. And so when he calls on Calvin Hooper, Calvin would have done anything in the world for Darl. And so very early on, you know, we've got this relationship building where the question is, how much do you love someone, you know? How much of yourself are you willing to risk in order to protect the ones you love?

GARCIA-NAVARRO: And that's sort of the central question of this book. I think I've waited long enough to bring in the man whom I suspect will be most readers' favorite character in the book. And that's Dwayne Brewer. He is Carol Brewer's brother - who was killed. Tell us a little bit about his backstory, who he is.

JOY: Dwayne Brewer and his brother Carol grew up kind of in an abusive home. And he also - he grew up at the very, very bottommost levels of poverty to the point that, you know, kids at school made fun of him because of the shoes he wore. Or they made fun of him because his - where his mother worked. And Dwayne has always protected his brother, you know, because Dwayne - he's a lot more physical. He's a lot more violent than Carol ever was. You know, Carol was very much a turn-the-other-cheek-type of guy. And when Dwayne looks back on his life, there's not really anything good that he can look back on except for his relationship with his brother. And he's always felt this dire⁹ need to protect his brother. You know, I think that's ultimately what eats him alive over the course of this novel - was the fact that he couldn't protect him.

But I think what makes Dwayne so interesting - is that he's the antagonist¹⁰, but he has a very strict moral code that he's following. One of the scariest things that can happen with a bad guy is when you find yourself completely agreeing with them, you know, when they make total sense. And I think there are multiple places in this novel where you find yourself nodding your head to do the things that Dwayne thinks and the things that Dwayne does.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: You've written about this area before. These are your people. You know, as a matter of fact, you and I spoke¹¹ last year about your essay "Digging In The Trash," in which you kind of lament¹² about how rural Southerners are often portrayed¹³. This seems to be sort of very personal for you.

JOY: Yeah. I think it is. And I think part of that just has to do with the misportrayal that happens oftentimes. I think a lot of times, rural, working-class people are stripped of their humanity. And I'm very much trying to give that humanity back. Another side of that, I think, is that I'm trying to document some of the things that I think are disappearing. You know, I think that we're within a generation of a lot of the old mountain ways being gone.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: You know, this novel is part of a grand Southern tradition, once called Southern gothic, now called Southern noir. And I guess the South Appalachia, this tradition of men on the land, you know, with guns that you write about, you know, hunting to survive - it's been so fetishized now in our popular discourse¹⁴. These characters, though, are very nuanced. It seems very pertinent¹⁵ to this political moment.

JOY: Yeah. You know, I've talked about that as well in the sense that, you know, I cannot imagine any American writer creating any anything right now where you don't have violence, where you don't have misogyny, where you don't have racism¹⁶, where you don't have xenophobia, where you don't have a perversion¹⁷ of faith. I think it's impossible for anyone to look at what's going on around us right now and ignore those things, you know? And writers and artists are very much sponges, you know? We soak up everything. And so I do think that's one of the reasons that that's so prevalent in my work.

And then, at the same time, you know, I think it's also always kind of been - those have been major themes in Appalachian literature and in Southern literature and Appalachian culture. I mean, when I think about, you know, the old murder ballads¹⁸ that they played in bluegrass, it was that same type of thing, those same types of stories. And that history - I'm not sure why that history exists. But as far as how it relates to what's happening nationally right now, I think maybe it's more pertinent right this second than it's ever been.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: David Joy's new novel is called "The Line That Held Us." Thank you so much.

JOY: Yeah.

(SOUNDBITE OF MOUNTAIN HOLLOW MUSIC'S "APPALACHIAN RAIN")

1 moody   

adj.心情不稳的，易怒的，喜怒无常的

参考例句：

• He relapsed into a moody silence.他又重新陷于忧郁的沉默中。
• I'd never marry that girl.She's so moody.我决不会和那女孩结婚的。她太易怒了。

2 brewer   

n. 啤酒制造者

参考例句：

• Brewer is a very interesting man. 布鲁尔是一个很有趣的人。
• I decided to quit my job to become a brewer. 我决定辞职，做一名酿酒人。

3 ferocious   

adj.凶猛的，残暴的，极度的，十分强烈的

参考例句：

• The ferocious winds seemed about to tear the ship to pieces.狂风仿佛要把船撕成碎片似的。
• The ferocious panther is chasing a rabbit.那只凶猛的豹子正追赶一只兔子。

4 avenged   

v.为…复仇，报…之仇( avenge的过去式和过去分词 )；为…报复

参考例句：

• She avenged her mother's death upon the Nazi soldiers. 她惩处了纳粹士兵以报杀母之仇。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The Indians avenged the burning of their village on〔upon〕 the settlers. 印第安人因为村庄被焚毁向拓居者们进行报复。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 ridge   

n.山脊；鼻梁；分水岭

参考例句：

• We clambered up the hillside to the ridge above.我们沿着山坡费力地爬上了山脊。
• The infantry were advancing to attack the ridge.步兵部队正在向前挺进攻打山脊。

6 margins   

边( margin的名词复数 )； 利润； 页边空白； 差数

参考例句：

• They have always had to make do with relatively small profit margins. 他们不得不经常设法应付较少的利润额。
• To create more space between the navigation items, add left and right margins to the links. 在每个项目间留更多的空隙，加左或者右的margins来定义链接。

7 killing   

n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财

参考例句：

• Investors are set to make a killing from the sell-off.投资者准备清仓以便大赚一笔。
• Last week my brother made a killing on Wall Street.上个周我兄弟在华尔街赚了一大笔。

8 sibling   

n.同胞手足(指兄、弟、姐或妹)

参考例句：

• Many of us hate living in the shadows of a more successful sibling.我们很多人都讨厌活在更为成功的手足的阴影下。
• Sibling ravalry has been common in this family.这个家里，兄弟姊妹之间的矛盾很平常。

9 dire   

adj.可怕的，悲惨的，阴惨的，极端的

参考例句：

• There were dire warnings about the dangers of watching too much TV.曾经有人就看电视太多的危害性提出严重警告。
• We were indeed in dire straits.But we pulled through.那时我们的困难真是大极了，但是我们渡过了困难。

10 antagonist   

n.敌人，对抗者，对手

参考例句：

• His antagonist in the debate was quicker than he.在辩论中他的对手比他反应快。
• The thing is to know the nature of your antagonist.要紧的是要了解你的对手的特性。

11 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

12 lament   

n.悲叹，悔恨，恸哭；v.哀悼，悔恨，悲叹

参考例句：

• Her face showed lament.她的脸上露出悲伤的样子。
• We lament the dead.我们哀悼死者。

13 portrayed   

v.画像( portray的过去式和过去分词 )；描述；描绘；描画

参考例句：

• Throughout the trial, he portrayed himself as the victim. 在审讯过程中，他始终把自己说成是受害者。
• The author portrayed his father as a vicious drunkard. 作者把他父亲描绘成一个可恶的酒鬼。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

14 discourse   

n.论文，演说；谈话；话语；vi.讲述，著述

参考例句：

• We'll discourse on the subject tonight.我们今晚要谈论这个问题。
• He fell into discourse with the customers who were drinking at the counter.他和站在柜台旁的酒客谈了起来。

15 pertinent   

adj.恰当的；贴切的；中肯的；有关的；相干的

参考例句：

• The expert made some pertinent comments on the scheme.那专家对规划提出了一些中肯的意见。
• These should guide him to pertinent questions for further study.这些将有助于他进一步研究有关问题。

16 racism   

n.民族主义；种族歧视(意识)

参考例句：

• He said that racism is endemic in this country.他说种族主义在该国很普遍。
• Racism causes political instability and violence.种族主义道致政治动荡和暴力事件。

17 perversion   

n.曲解；堕落；反常

参考例句：

• In its most general sense,corruption means the perversion or abandonment.就其最一般的意义上说，舞弊就是堕落，就是背离准则。
• Her account was a perversion of the truth.她所讲的歪曲了事实。

18 ballads   

民歌，民谣，特别指叙述故事的歌( ballad的名词复数 )； 讴

参考例句：

• She belted out ballads and hillbilly songs one after another all evening. 她整晚一个接一个地大唱民谣和乡村小调。
• She taught him to read and even to sing two or three little ballads,accompanying him on her old piano. 她教他读书，还教他唱两三首民谣，弹着她的旧钢琴为他伴奏。