Ron Rash comes to Books at Noon this week to discuss his latest work, Above the Waterfall.
When and where do you like to read?
I read in all sorts of places, but my favorite is by a fireplace in winter.
What were your favorite books as a child?
Call of the Wild, Tom Sawyer, A Jesse Stuart Reader, the Hardy Boys series, Poe’s short stories.
What books had the greatest impact on you?
I read Crime and Punishment when I was fifteen. Until then I had entered books; that book entered me. Dostoevsky continues to be as important to me as any novelist. Look Homeward, Angel, which I read when I was eighteen, was very important as well, in part because I grew up in the same region of North Carolina. Other important books early on were The Moviegoer, As I Lay Dying, Invisible Man, the stories of Flannery O’Connor.
Would you like to name a few writers out there you think deserve greater readership?
Jean Giono (both here and in France), Ann Pancake, Donald Harington, Percival Everett, In poetry, Robert Morgan. His long poem “Mockingbird” is my favorite poem by a living American.
What was the last book you recommended?
I’m always recommending Giono, especially The Song of the World, and also Katherine Anne Porter’s Pale Horse, Pale Rider and Bao Ninh’s The Sorrow of War. A recent novel that I recommend is The Narrow Road to the Deep North by the Tasmanian writer Richard Flanagan.
What do you plan to read next?
I’m currently William Finnegan’s surfing memoir, which I’m enjoying very much, and reading a good bit of poetry, particularly Hart Crane.