Don Graham
Features
The Bucket List
Driving the River Road, in far West Texas; having a drink at the Mansion on Turtle Creek, in Dallas; fishing for bass in Caddo Lake; eating a chicken-fried steak in Strawn; searching for a lightning whelk along the coast; and 58 other things that all Texans must do before they die.
Alamo Heights
So much is at stake that we almost—almost—believe the release date of Disney's epic-to-be was delayed from Christmas Day to April for the reasons the studio claims. But given the way historical movies usually turn out, can you blame us for smirking?
The Secret History
Did Richard King cheat his partner's heirs out of a chunk of the King Ranch nearly 120 years ago? He may have—and if the Texas Supreme Court permits Chapman v. King Ranch, Inc., to go to trial, the past could come back to haunt the state's most storied spread.
Mission: Impossible
Rumor has it that director Ron Howard and screenwriter John Sayles are coming to Austin this spring to make a $100 million movie about the Alamo. It may be too much to ask that they get Texas' defining battle right (since no one knows what really happened), but I've got my fingers crossed—and a few friendly words of advice.
Writers Bloc
What did Graham Greene observe about crossing the border into Mexico in 1938? Would you believe Molly Ivins was born in California? Here are my picks for the fifty greatest literary moments in Texas, plus a roster of leading lights who are from here—and some who aren't.
Wayne’s World
A flood, a fire, a car accident, a murder, and of course, a restaging of the battle for Texas’ independence: scenes from the making of The Alamo.
Picture Perfect
Why Peter Bogdanovich filmed in black and white, who discovered Cybill Shepherd, which onetime soap opera diva read for the role of Jacy, and other secrets of the making of The Last Picture Show .
Unreality Bites
As ever, Texas looms large in the movies’ imagination—large and largely inaccurate.
Canon Fever
Our selections for some of the best contemporary Texas books.
Pen Pals
Dobie, Bedichek, and Webb were the leading Texas writers and intellectuals of their age. But as ribald raconteurs, they were ahead of their time.
Columns | Miscellany
Please Go Away
Cormac McCarthy’s ubiquity problem.
Dunces of Confederacy
What to do about those controversial statues on the University of Texas at Austin campus.
You’ve Got Mailer
The famously crotchety writer’s hate-love relationship with Texas.
All the Pretty Corpses
Cormac McCarthy’s latest is bloody good.
Mary, Quite Contrary
The awful truth about The Liars’ Club.
Fallen Heroes
One riot, one Ranger, one much-maligned historian: rereading Walter Prescott Webb.
Accentuate The Negative
To read a Patricia Highsmith novel is to suspend one’s moral judgments. She irresistibly persuades us to side with killers and other amoral characters.
White Like Me
Growing up in segregated Collin County, I was oblivious to the impact of Jim Crow—until I read John Howard Griffin's American classic.
Expatriate Act
While some Texas-born writers had to leave home to do their best work, for John Graves the reverse was true.
Nation State
Does anyone outside of Texas care about Texas history? H. W. Brands hopes so, and he's not the only one.
Not-So-Great Plains
Suzan-Lori Parks gets the culture and cadence of West Texas right, sort of; Annie Proulx doesn't.
Not Moving On
Fifteen years after Larry McMurtry announced he was through writing novels, he shows no sign of letting up. For this we should be thankful.
Master Class
No one took the literature of Texas or the Southwest seriously until J. Frank Dobie put it, and us, on the map.
Giant
Master of the Senate, Robert Caro's third volume on the life of Lyndon Johnson, is an exhaustive study of power, persuasion, and private parts.
Horseman, Pass By
Forty years after its publication, Horseman, Pass By is still one of Larry McMurtry's finest novels—and as groundbreaking as J. D. Salinger's masterpiece.
Donald Barthelme: The Genesis of a Cool Sound
A memoir conjures up Donald Barthelme—and sheds light on his talented siblings.
Knightmare
Aaron Latham's new novel about a cowboy Camelot gets lost in the bull.
Confessions of a Washed-up Sportswriter (Including Various Digressions About Sex, Crime, and Other Hobbies)
Confessions of a Washed-up Sportswriter (Including Various Digressions About Sex, Crime, and Other Hobbies.)
The Pits
The problem with Mary Karr's latest confessional memoir, Cherry, is that she won't stop confessing.
Cotton Tale
Long before Lonesome Dove and other cattle-culture classics defined Texas for the world, Hold Autumn in Your Hand—a novel that wasn’t about cowboys or Longhorns—won critical acclaim. With good reason.
Katherine the Great
Indian Creek native Katherine Anne Porter is the finest author ever to come out of Texas. But only recently has her home state stopped writing her off.
And The Earth Did Not Devour Him
. . . And the Earth Did Not Devour Him.
The Perfect Sonya
The Perfect Sonya.
Strange Peaches
Strange Peaches.
Alpaca
Alpaca
The Western Edge
Blood Meridian.
A Soldier's Story
Sam Chamberlain's My Confession.
A Woman of Independent Means
My First Thirty Years.
Reporter
Father Knows West
Is it time to revisit Larry McMurtry’s Berrybender Narratives?
Gunfire and Brimstone
Fort Worth preacher J. Frank Norris paved the way for today’s televangelists. But he’s probably best known as the defendant in a wild 1927 murder trial.
The Book of Elmer
Bohemian Rhapsody
An ambitious, sometimes bewildering, debut novel about Czech Texas.
Short Book, Sorry
Larry McMurtry’s new memoir plays it close to the vest.
Paradise
Larry McMurty's latest.
A Prince of a Fellow
A Prince of a Fellow
Rain Man
The Time It Never Rained.
Acting the Part
Rules for movies about music.
Trailblazer
The Log of a Cowboy.
Mission Impossible
Viva Max!
Stream of Consciousness
Rereading John Graves
Border Skirmish
Américo Paredes.
North Dallas Forty
Don Graham on Peter Gent.
O Pioneers!
Don Graham on Sallie Reynolds Matthews.
Mr. Texas
Don Graham doffs his hat to J. Frank Dobie.
Southern Discomfort
Don Graham remembers Willie Morris.
Beyond the Pale
Don Graham corrals Pale Horse, Pale Rider.
The Johnson Treatment
Don Graham rereads The Gay Place.
The First Picture Show
Horseman, Pass By
Web Exclusives
Friedrichsburg Revisited
The German novel, penned in 1867 and set in the just-settled Hill Country hamlet, gets a modern translation.
Now That's Comedy
What's so funny about an oilman, a rancher, a golfer, and a carnival hobo? Watch the following top ten funniest Texas movies to find out why these main characters (and others) are so hilarious.
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