Feet On The Street: Rambles Around New Orleans (2005) - Plot & Excerpts
“One trick is to tell 'em stories that don't go anywhere, like the time I caught the ferry over to Shelbyville. I needed a new heel for my shoe, so, I decided to go to Morganville, which is what they called Shelbyville in those days. So I tied an onion to my belt, which was the style at the time. Now, to take the ferry cost a nickel, and in those days, nickels had pictures of bumblebees on 'em. "Give me five bees for a quarter," you'd say. Now, where were we? Oh yeah, the important thing was I had an onion on my belt, which was the style at the time. They didn't have white onions because of the war. The only thing you could get was those big yellow ones … “-tGrandpa Simpson (doing a spot on imitation of Roy Blount Jr.)I’m familiar with Roy Blount Jr. because of his appearances on NPR’s Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me so I figured I’d read one of his books. I don’t know if Feet on the Street: Rambles Around New Orleans is representative of his other work, but it was a rather disappointing read. I think the concept behind the book was that he’d walk through various areas of New Orleans and use this as a jumping off point to describe the culture, food, architecture, music, history or other bit of N’awlins lore. This isn’t a particularly novel idea, but it’s a completely serviceable organizing principle. Unfortunately, what follows is a scattershot mix that includes some of the above, plus numerous personal anecdotes that serve to illustrate very little about the city or Blount himself (except perhaps to repeatedly assure us that he is not gay and did nothing to consciously encourage the advances of those men).The book has the dashed off feel of someone who doesn’t have all that much to say about the topic and really doesn’t want to do the hard work required to research the subject, but is going to meet that contractual deadline and word count come hell or highwater. To add insult to injury, the book came out just before Hurricane Katrina struck the city and Blount unfortunately quotes several individuals who bluster about riding out the next big hurricane and how they ‘want to be there when it happens’. Big talk, from dumb people.
Well, let's start with the good stuff. As a lover of New Orleans, and literature about New Orleans, I appreciate the little nuggets, historical tidbits, and anecdotes that Roy Blount, Jr. shares in this book. And I especially love the title, a nod to a favorite in the NOLA musical canon, "Didn't He Ramble."However, a more accurate subtitle to this book would be "Ramblings somewhat about New Orleans" as opposed to "Rambles Around New Orleans." Blount constantly veers off-topic...and stays there. Maybe Blount is striving for the authenticity of actual storytelling, where you start off talking about one thing and end up somewhere else only mildly related. This approach, intentional or not, didn't work well in this text.Actually, maybe it could've worked well if Blount veered into a topic that was still about New Orleans, instead of long-winded analyses of his friends Matthew and Slick, or whatever else. I'm all for weaving in back story and introspection, but Blount dwells on them too long. I also loved the idea of "Lagniappe" at the end of each chapter, but more often than not, these snapshots seemed to have little do with the chapter's subject, and if so, didn't add much.
What do You think about Feet On The Street: Rambles Around New Orleans (2005)?
It was good, but I've read better books about NOLA. I would, howver, like to share some eerie, prophetic passages, as the book was published about 7 months before the levee failures."When the big hurricane hits-and it will, New Orleanians assure you, with what suffices locally for civic pride-the waters will finally rise over the shell and inundate the town, killing tens of thousands." p. 13"Many New Orleanians, in what suffices locally for prudence, have taken the precaution, officially urged by what suffices locally for civil authority, of keeping an ax in the attic. So they can chop a hole up through the roof, when the time comes, and rise above the flood." pp.13-14
—Jamie
Beginning and ending, of course, with The River ("ending" being an operative word in this mid-2005 copyright, in that Roy muses about the imminent destruction of the city by Her Man), with everything from sweat to oysters (and more oyster) to strippers to jazz to characters in between, Roy Blount, Jr.'s brief but pungent travelogue is essential reading for any traveler headed for The Crescent City. And it's more than the author's patented but always surprising sly turns of phrase that make it more than a travelogue: FEET ON THE STREET is personal as well, with the litany of places to be, people to meet, sounds to hear, and food to eat tied together by somber remembrance of things past.
—Phil Overeem
Feet on the Street: Rambles Around New Orleans by Roy Blount, Jr. We are planning on visiting New Orleans way in the future so I have been looking at travel guides and maps and stumbled across this marvelous walk about N.O. This fun guide around town is divided into several chunks but the best deal with food! Blount seems to know his town, or at least, the Quarter. It seems like he has hiked every street there is and there are plenty of them. He was a reporter for a while for the Times-Picayune and so I imagine he has visited a lot of corners that us average tourists would never check. I also suspect that Roy Blount is one of those guys who can strike up a conversation with a stranger which is probably a good thing. I can't wait to give it a try!
—Charles Moore
