[Slowhand] Robert Johnson literature boom

[John Broholm]

Slowhanders:

Time for a serious post, now that I've de-lurked with
a sarcastic one.

The Elijah Wald book on Robert Johnson, "Escaping the
Delta," has caused some comment and criticism on the
Slowhand Digest. Two other recent books might interest
you.

This morning I saw a blurb for "Robert Johnson:
Mythmaking and Contemporary Culture," by Patricia R.
Schroeder. The blurb says: "Explores the Mississippi
bluesman's status as a cultural icon, including images
in novels, plays, and films, and on a postage stamp."
It's definitely a "scholarly" book (U. of Illinois
Press). I can't vouch for it because I haven't read
it, but it sounds a bit on the post-modern / cultural
fuzzy studies side.

I can vouch for another book, which was published in
2003. "Robert Johnson: Lost and Found," by Barry Lee
Pearson and Bill McCulloch, takes a cold-eyed look at
how the legend (selling his soul at the crossroads to
the devil) was constructed. It's a critical analysis
-- the authors are NOT post-mods -- of the biography,
history and criticism that've been done about Johnson.
Its purpose is sorting fact from conjecture, and I
think it does an outstanding job, so if you're
interested in Johnson or historical analysis, you
might take a look at it. I thought I was fairly well
read-up on Johnson, and I learned all kinds of stuff
from this book. The mentions of Clapton are fairly
peripheral; he's cited as evidence of how the legend
spread. It is also a Univ. of Illinois Press imprint,
so they're steadily rollin' out Robert Johnson
material in Urbana-Champaign.

(I have no material interest, financial or otherwise,
in any of these titles or publishers.)

Enjoy 'em if you can find 'em. 

JB
jbroholm at sbcglobal.net