Ebook275 pages4 hours
Pirates You Don't Know: And Other Adventures in the Examined Life: Collected Essays
Rating: 0 out of 5 stars
()
About this ebook
“In this beautiful book about striving and surviving, every essay displays a well-stocked brain grappling with life’s thorny problems.”—Debra Monroe, author of On the Outskirts of Normal
For nearly ten years John Griswold has been publishing his essays in Inside Higher Ed, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Brevity, Ninth Letter, and Adjunct Advocate, many under the pen name Oronte Churm. Churm’s topics have ranged widely, exploring themes such as the writing life and the utility of creative-writing classes, race issues in a university town, and the beautiful, protective crocodiles that lie patiently waiting in the minds of fathers.
Though Griswold recently entered the tenure stream, much of his experience, at a Big Ten university, has been as an adjunct lecturer—that tenuous and uncertain position so many now occupy in higher education. In Pirates You Don’t Know, Griswold writes poignantly and hilariously about the contingent nature of this life, tying it to his birth in the last American enclave in Saigon during the Vietnam War, his upbringing in a coal town in southern Illinois, and his experience as an army deep-sea diver and frogman. He investigates class in America through four generations of his family and portrays the continuing joys and challenges of fatherhood while making a living, becoming literate, and staying open to the world.
“In examining his life as teacher, father, husband, son, Griswold causes us to consider our own lives and how we spend them. These essays are wise, hilarious, and necessary.”—John Warner, author of The Writer’s Practice
For nearly ten years John Griswold has been publishing his essays in Inside Higher Ed, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Brevity, Ninth Letter, and Adjunct Advocate, many under the pen name Oronte Churm. Churm’s topics have ranged widely, exploring themes such as the writing life and the utility of creative-writing classes, race issues in a university town, and the beautiful, protective crocodiles that lie patiently waiting in the minds of fathers.
Though Griswold recently entered the tenure stream, much of his experience, at a Big Ten university, has been as an adjunct lecturer—that tenuous and uncertain position so many now occupy in higher education. In Pirates You Don’t Know, Griswold writes poignantly and hilariously about the contingent nature of this life, tying it to his birth in the last American enclave in Saigon during the Vietnam War, his upbringing in a coal town in southern Illinois, and his experience as an army deep-sea diver and frogman. He investigates class in America through four generations of his family and portrays the continuing joys and challenges of fatherhood while making a living, becoming literate, and staying open to the world.
“In examining his life as teacher, father, husband, son, Griswold causes us to consider our own lives and how we spend them. These essays are wise, hilarious, and necessary.”—John Warner, author of The Writer’s Practice
Author
John Griswold
JOHN GRISWOLD is a staff writer at the Common Reader, a publication of Washington University in St. Louis. He is the author of A Democracy of Ghosts; Herrin: The Brief History of an Infamous American City; and Pirates You Don’t Know (Georgia). He has also written extensively (as Oronte Churm) at Inside Higher Ed and McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. He lives in the St. Louis metro area.
Read more from John Griswold
Herrin: The Brief History of an Infamous American City Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Age of Clear Profit: Essays on Home and the Narrow Road Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Pirates You Don't Know
Related ebooks
Sightings: Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Curse of the Vampire Robot Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFlash Fiction Online: December 2014 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Lock and Key Library Classic Mystery and Detective Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Matter of Words: 21 Short Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCreatures That Once Were Men and Other Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDubliners Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings3 books to know Literary Realism Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings3 Books To Know Gay Literature Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Charles Dickens Collection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAbducting Arnold Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsI Nearly Died Laughing Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFour Short Stories of Suspense Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMaking Conversation Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFantastic Fables Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Flash Fiction Online: February 2014 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Best Laid Plans: 21 Stories of Mystery & Suspense: A Superior Shores Anthology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMystery & Investigation Anthology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFrom the Darkness Right Under Our Feet Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Identity Suspected and Other Flash Fiction Pieces from Varon Burgess Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings3 books to know Brontë Sisters Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA First Year of Random: A Collection of Short Stories Inspired by Social Media Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLUPIN - The Adventures of Gentleman Thief: 8 Novels & 20 Novellas in One Collection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings101 Funny Things About Global Warming Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Weed Whisperer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Is Santa Claus Super? Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe House on Alexandrine Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMore than Somewhat Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsInternational Kittens of Mystery Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5O, What a Luxury: Verses Lyrical, Vulgar, Pathetic & Profound Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Pirates You Don't Know
Rating: 0 out of 5 stars
0 ratings
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Pirates You Don't Know - John Griswold
je book_preview_excerpt.html }|ێFaJ@dخ$HROM$Z,=9)u
Эݮ瘙|EY<"_~wiK?J>ˏ'_^+su!~bҝIIÔ%ˡ96%6i0/͒_/&,!ɣ>9/~×Ms\TG܄aqC>i˚s3kj_o 1-)
V\¥1MC\.B}Sڵ+?%OCsz,M~n
dlqGaBh<RsR0wXTKHcJIB F
akLNa!G18rx t^qa6R/mLȢDL"Mחug/=vKWWro
o8Gn%M;ǰ3q˥9sGj;vKYiJ},%_뢦Ee\͙l"u&!1͒,Vb=,3/ݧZe9m5_\S1G.vhV.Oi|bl:5!*O&9!Uȝso#yp~.ag1uIo\"/}b-b#5^IK|{,D{Lp;4rRV#LZ3`],iWzy@}z2|6uX-(zczƎm9, G[GJOz
bo86#8dEb\k(
sV6jPpET顁la쯛x==n~H.WCHaH"|Nbt9?_BA͟ _N>?pg~ሴнn-͈L-b
=C*_} 0D V`ï j#u'
Cb[tT:1p9}bҐ7a|gZ$"O7\Krs}ؖ[d]nJ0㖶k0`T?Dq/[8BN}X,XOidƹKsjMȬ-#n
zl}@>ڍO)Lk,A=%Z2ʾ22߄1BYt&;õOB&L',CZ[OEȂQ(=a~Jc`DBe67 -`I BRܻ)0-D. U6Dh0D݊UД|^1ÞݼO^Dqsΰ1
*d}CZP*DZWG T6[}ViӮZ kb&Tּۿ6eLLer, iʶ,y*&M.+.p`_`YwL@snnTC5$'9>@Ti!).&
5wx+tuy&4r|轗vW
za;܋&~@&qVfN\JjpP
{~+^-k">7)NBP:BW`k&T0\.D#|F`ʿg&CIrֶuҋFFa-D Bd?tLe /DL< 0^
Py+RoD%vğ{Ϊ}C "{uc!nQ2lڠfWY.,
Xd'6vJO_
neڇhT#dJR