Crunching Gravel: A Wisconsin Boyhood in the Thirties (A North Coast Book)

Biographies & Memoirs

Peters, Robert Louis

Arts & Literature

University of Wisconsin Press

<div> No nostalgic tale of the good old days, Robert Peters's recollections of his adolescence vividly evoke the Depression on a hardscrabble farm near Eagle River: Dad driving the Vilas County Relief truck, Lars the Swede freezing to death on his porch, the embarassment of graduation in a suit from welfare. The hard efforts to put fish and potatoes and blueberries on the table are punctuated by occasional pleasures: the Memorial Day celebration, swimming at Perch Lake, the county fair with Mother's prizes for jam and the exotic delights of the midway. Peters's clear-eyed memoir reveals a poet's eye for rich and stark detail even as a boy of twelve. "Peters misses nothing, from the details of the town's Fourth of July celebration to the cause and effect of a young cousin's suicide to the calibrations of racism toward Indians that was so acceptable then. It is a fascinating, unsentimental look at a piece of our past."--Margaret E. Guthrie, New York Times Book Review "It's unlikely that any other contemporary poet and scholar as distinguished has risen from quite so humble beginnings as Robert Peters. Born and raised by semiliterate parents on a subsistence farm in northeastern Wisconsin, Peters lived harrowingly close to the eventual stuff of his poetry--the dependency of humans on animal lives, the inexplicable and ordinary heroism and baseness of people facing extreme conditions, the urgency of physical desire. . . . Sterling childhood memoirs."--Booklist "Robert Peters has written a memoir exemplary because he insists on the specific, on the personal and the local. It is also enormously satisfying to read, and it is among the most authentic accounts of childhood and youth I know--a Wisconsin David Copperfield!"--Thom Gunn </div>

This is a sequel to the author's Crunching Gravel: A Wisconsin Boyhood in the Thirties. This account covers from when Robert Peters leaves the farm and is drafted into the Army during World War II. It is in Paris where he hears Marlene Dietrich sing Lili Marlene.

Drafted into the U.S. army in 1943, Robert Peters was a shy and devout eighteen-year-old from a remote and impoverished Wisconsin farm. Now one of our leading poets, he has written a lyrical memoir of a young man coming of age in the middle of World War II, making his way through personal land mines of morality and sexuality. In this sequel to Crunching Gravel, his celebrated account of a rural boyhood, Peters writes with humor and honesty of his self-revelations. After a moving leave-taking from his family and the wilderness farm he loves, he is thrust into army life. The close quarters of the barracks, the horseplay among the men, the bravado regarding war and women, and the unshakable military taboo against "perverts" throw him into confusion. Troubled by homosexual feelings, he struggles to get through basic training in South Carolina without earning the label "sissy." Inspired by patriotism and Hollywood war movies, he carefully practices his salute. Disillusioned by a cynical post chaplain, he abandons his plans to become a Lutheran minister. As awkward with his M1 rifle as he had been at home with a deer rifle, Peters is classified as a clerk and shipped to England. He hangs back in turmoil as London streetwalkers proposition him and older soldiers flirt with him. On leave in Paris, where he finally shares a prostitute with a friend he silently loves, he visits the Louvre and waits for hours in line to see the glamorous Marlene Dietrich. Through the war and the post-war occupation of Germany, as Peters's diligence and growing confidence result in promotion to battalion sergeant-major, the voice of Dietrich singing "Lili Marlene" stays with him, evoking love and beauty in the midst of destruction and deprivation.

For You, Lili Marlene: A Memoir Of World War II (A North Coast Book)

Historical

Drafted into the U.S. army in 1943, Robert Peters was a shy and devout eighteen-year-old from a remote and impoverished Wisconsin farm. Now one of our leading poets, he has written a lyrical memoir of a young man coming of age in the middle of World War II, making his way through personal land mines of morality and sexuality. In this sequel to Crunching Gravel, his celebrated account of a rural boyhood, Peters writes with humor and honesty of his self-revelations. After a moving leave-taking from his family and the wilderness farm he loves, he is thrust into army life. The close quarters of the barracks, the horseplay among the men, the bravado regarding war and women, and the unshakable military taboo against "perverts" throw him into confusion. Troubled by homosexual feelings, he struggles to get through basic training in South Carolina without earning the label "sissy." Inspired by patriotism and Hollywood war movies, he carefully practices his salute. Disillusioned by a cynical post chaplain, he abandons his plans to become a Lutheran minister. As awkward with his M1 rifle as he had been at home with a deer rifle, Peters is classified as a clerk and shipped to England. He hangs back in turmoil as London streetwalkers proposition him and older soldiers flirt with him. On leave in Paris, where he finally shares a prostitute with a friend he silently loves, he visits the Louvre and waits for hours in line to see the glamorous Marlene Dietrich. Through the war and the post-war occupation of Germany, as Peters's diligence and growing confidence result in promotion to battalion sergeant-major, the voice of Dietrich singing "Lili Marlene" stays with him, evoking love and beauty in themidst of destruction and deprivation.

For You, Lili Marlene: A Memoir of World War II (North Coast Books)

Not since John Berryman's Homage to Mistress Bradstreet has there been a more remarkable embodiment of an historic personality in poetic form than in this book. Through lyric and narrative sequences of great variety, Robert Peters becomes Ann Lee, the Mother Founder of the Shakers. He imaginatively relives her extraordinary life, from her childhood to her arrival with the first Shakers in American two hundred years ago. Visionary, full of craft and song, The Gift to Be Simple is a poem made of poems that stand on their own. Taken as a whole, they make a reading experience of unforgettable vividness.

The Gift to Be Simple: A Garland for Ann Lee

Literature & Fiction

Poetry

Liveright

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Books by Peters, Robert Louis

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Peters, Robert Louis. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Crunching Gravel: A Wisconsin Boyhood in the Thirties (A North Coast Book)

Crunching Gravel: A Wisconsin Boyhood in the Thirties (A North Coast Book)

Crunching Gravel: A Wisconsin Boyhood in the Thirties (A North Coast Book)

For You, Lili Marlene: A Memoir Of World War II (A North Coast Book)

For You, Lili Marlene: A Memoir of World War II (North Coast Books)

The Gift to Be Simple: A Garland for Ann Lee