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Praise for No Heroes

If Mr. Offutts life were a hillbillys song, every verse would be a voice-cracker.... [ No Heroes ] is a crystalline image of what the past can do when you love it too much to let it go.

William L. Hamilton, The New York Times

Offutt is such a fine raconteur and so full of self-effacing charm, humor, and intelligent observation that his memoir is a joy to read and may, as they say in the hills, break your little heart.

Ron Hansen, America

Although many writers have mourned the past in print, Offutt does so with a singular grace and clarity. His sentences are crisp and exact, as distilled as moonshine.

John Freeman, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Some might consider it presumptuous to publish a look back at ones first forty years, but Chris Offutts wonderful No Heroes makes you hunger for more. Ten-year updates? Ill be there. This work is that intoxicating.

Carlo Wolff, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Pure, and utterly affecting.

Rebecca Bengal, Austin American-Statesman

Offutt writes without sentiment about the sentimental pull of our roots.... No Heroes is a keepsake of good writing.

Steve Duin, The Oregonian

Offutts writing is gorgeous.

Mary Jane Park, St. Petersburg Times

This beautifully written book [is a]... rewarding read.

Ruth K. Baacke, Library Journal

The authors mastery shows in the way he... makes No Heroes an intriguing and enjoyable read.

William Dieter, Rocky Mountain News

Offutts bold refusal to submit to nostalgic sentimentality... and his skill as a prose stylist set this book apart.

Publishers Weekly

A LSO BY C HRIS O FFUTT

Out of the Woods

The Good Brother

The Same River Twice

Kentucky Straight

SIMON & SCHUSTER

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Copyright 2002 by Chris Offutt

All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

First Simon & Schuster trade paperback edition 2003

SIMON & SCHUSTER and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster Inc.

For information about special discounts for bulk purchases, please contact Simon & Schuster Special Sales: 1-800-456-6798 or

Designed by Katy Riegel

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

ISBN 0-684-86551-3

ISBN 0-684-86552-1 (Pbk)

ISBN 978-1-5011-5036-4 (eBook)

To Mrs. Jayne, my first-grade teacher

A place belongs forever to whoever claims it hardest, remembers it most obsessively, wrenches it from itself, shapes it, renders it, loves it so radically that he remakes it in his own image.

J OAN D IDION

Portions of this book appeared in various forms in The New York Times Sunday Magazine, River Teeth, ACE Magazine , and OK You Mugs .

For providing time and space to work, the author wishes to thank Yaddo and Minnow.

No matter how you leave the hillsthe army, prison, marriage, a jobwhen you move back after twenty years, the whole county is carefully watching. They want to see the changes that the outside world put on you. They are curious to know if youve lost your laughter. They are worried that perhaps youve gotten above your raisings.

To reassure the community, you should dress down except when you have to dress up, then wear your Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes. Make sure you drive a rusty pickup that runs like a sewing machine, flies low on the straight stretch, and hauls block up a creek bed. Hang dice from the mirror and a gun rack in the back window. A rifle isnt necessary, but something needs to be therea pool cue, a carpenters level, an ax handle. Where the front plate should be, screw one on that says American by birth, Kentuckian by the grace of God.

Be polite to everybody. Even if you are certain you have never seen this lady in your life, ask how her family is. No matter that this man once tore you up one side and down the other, the worst skull-dragging in county history, let bygones be bygones. Smile and nod, smile and nod. When a conversation ends, always say See you in church.

Tell them its a big world out there. The desert is hotter than Satans Hades. The Rocky Mountains are higher than our hills. The ocean is polluted, cities smell bad, and a working man never gets ahead. Dont talk about the beautiful people in stylish clothes. Never mention museums, the opera, theater, and ethnic restaurants. Forget the time you visited a movie star in his home, drank a thousand-dollar bottle of wine, or rode all over Chicago in a limo. That sunset walk across the Brooklyn Bridge doesnt hold a candle to crossing Lick Fork Creek on a one-man swaying bridge. Fine dining will make you fat, but fresh butter on corn bread will make you cry.

Take home as many books as you can. Every bookstore at home for fifty miles is heavy on cookbooks, mysteries, and romance, but a little short on poetry. Remember, poetry in the hills is found, not written. It lies in the handles of tools passed down through families, an ax sharpened so many times the blade is the size of a pocketknife.

Bring palpable evidence of where youve been. Take back objects to hold and smellno photographs. Take back a stuffed possum, subway tokens, a hockey puck, petrified rock, a porcupine quill, a buffalo hide. Be prepared at all times to say its better here. You spent twenty years trying to get out of Rowan County and twenty more trying to get back.

Before you leave the city, dont forget to borrow CDs from your friends and make copies of music no radio plays and no store sells. Jazz in the hills is a verb, and pop is what you drink. The Motown sound is a sweet rumble made by muscle cars. Soul is the province of the preacher, and the blues is what going to town will fix. Remember, you wont ever get tired of sitting on the back porch facing the woods with a group of people playing banjo, guitar, mandolin, and fiddle. They will make music through dusk and into the night, a sound so sweet the songbirds lie down and die.

Now that youve got a houseful of what you cant get, think about what you dont need anymore. Best left behind is the tuxedo. Youll never wear it here. May as well trade your foreign car for American if you want to get it worked on. Youll not need burglar alarms, bike locks, or removable car stereo systems. The only gated community is a pasture. The most important things you can get rid of are the habits of the outside world. Here, you wont get judged by your jeans and boots, your poor schooling, or your country accent. Never again will you worry that youre using the wrong fork, saying the wrong thing, or expecting people to keep their word. Nobody here lies except the known liars, and theyre great to listen to.

No more will you need to prove your intelligence to bigots. You can go ahead and forget all your preplanned responses to comments about wearing shoes, the movie Deliverance, indoor plumbing, and incest. You dont have to work four times as hard because the boss expects so little. You dont have to worry about waiting for the chance to intellectually ambush some nitwit who thinks youre stupid because of where youre from.