Comments on: Paul Hemphill: Our great loss

By: eleanor ringel cater

eleanor ringel cater — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 14:05:23 +0000

One of the last times I saw Paul before he got sick was at Manuel’s. My new husband and I had been invited to someone’s book signing and Arthur didn’t know anybody. The first one to walk up and make him feel as if he belonged was Paul Hemphill.
It was one of his many gifts.
Thanks to Keith and everyone else for sharing their thoughts. Somehow makes his loss a little easier. A little…..

By: Marcia Proctor

Marcia Proctor — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 16:35:13 +0000

“Reading Paul was simply a privilege.”

Indeed.

Thank you, Keith.

By: Radiowiz

Radiowiz — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 19:33:03 +0000

I don’t have what you could call heros but I do have people in my life that have affected me in some deep way…usually because their subject matter was the outsiders looking in ….Yes, strange as it seems they were all writers ….

Garrison Keillor, Terry Kay, Lewis Grizzard for instance..

We lost a good one the other day ……

He attempted pro ball right down the road from me, in Graceville Florida …he smoked and drank to excess…but are not all the really good writers tortured in some special way ?? Aren’t they all petulant chiildren? I guess it takes a child to see what’s there and say what needs to be said . Yes even Jesus appreciated the guilessness of children..One of my favorite scriptures ”

” I tell you the truth -anyone who will not recieve the Kingdom of God like a little child will not enter it.” Luke 18:17

I ran across an article in Writers Digest many years ago and stuck it in my notebook, knowing I would use it when the going gets rough

“If your writing is too clear, your sentences are dull. I’ll tell you a great example. I taught third grade and had a little girl —she was 7 or 8 years old – who wrote this sentence –

” Coming here is nice but leaving here is sad but leaving here is sadder than coming here is nice”

That’s like somthing out of Joyce -thats the way she writes naturally. She will get poor teachers and that will be destroyed because it’s not grammaticallly correct

Williiam Price Fox-Author of Chitlin Strut and other Madrigals

And yet when they lean words on the paper…when they hit the right notes ,doesn’t it bring the sweetest pain -like touching that sore inside your mouth–it hurts but it feels so good at the same time

Words that stir emotions inside you ..emotions only you know , in the middle of the night when no one is watching.

Once someone said writing a daily column is like being married to a nymphomaniac –it’s ok for a couple of weeks and then it becomes a real chore…..

Someone else said …”you sit staring at a typewriter until the blood drops pop out of your forehead “. …

Paul Hemphill was brave enough to jump in bed with that nympho….and those of us who stumbled across his output on some dusty library shelf in West Georgia were all the richer ……

Michael

By: Michael

Michael — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 15:34:49 +0000

I had the great pleasure of talking with Paul a couple of times at social gatherings. He had such an ‘easy elegance’ of conversation and was always interesting and interested in all subjects.
I think it’s a loss for all of us but his stories and impact will live on. A great Southerner…

By: Bob Lamb

Bob Lamb — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 14:42:24 +0000

I didn’t know Paul was dead, or even ill, until I read Keith’s report just now. What a loss!
I knew Paul when he was sports editor at The Augusta Chronicle (and I was a reporter for the evening paper, The Herald.)
Even in those days, it was obvious that he was destined for bigger and better things. Now and then, when I think of all the tlented people I was honored to work with in Southern newsrooms, I know how blessed I was to come along when I did and to wind up — wholly by accident! — working in journalism. Paul will be missed!

By: Tom Baxter

Tom Baxter — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 14:40:50 +0000

When someone writes something, and you read it once, and it sticks in your mind going on four decades, that writer has something. Paul’s essay, “Quitting the Newspaper,” is listed as being published in a collection in 1981, but I distinctly remember reading it in some upstart journalism review a good decade earlier, before I went to work for the paper he quit. I stand corrected if I’m wrong about that. In any case, if a gathering like the one suggested by Marcia Killingsworth ever takes place, that piece should be read aloud.

By: Chris Wohlwend

Chris Wohlwend — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 13:21:23 +0000

A sad day for literature, a sad day for the South. Janet Ward said it best. My heart goes out to Susan and the rest of the family.

By: Anita Sharpe

Anita Sharpe — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 12:06:30 +0000

I didn’t really know Paul but loved Long Gone — a great book that, like most great books, made me feel like I knew the author (and I’m a big fan of Susan’s). So sorry to hear the news.

By: Marcia Killingsworth

Marcia Killingsworth — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 07:28:23 +0000

I’m with Jonna… Funerals are too late. We need to start making time to gather *now*… and not just Atlanta Press Club events, either. We should find some way to get together and celebrate our ATL writers on a regular basis, just for fun. People like Jim Auchmutey, Drew Jubera, Jane Hansen and the other greats of our local media who’ve captured our history, lives, traditions and uncovered our scandals, but who may not be in the spotlight at the moment. Those of us who appreciate these writers – and sooo many others – should organize regular celebration gatherings. If we build it, d’you think they’d come??

By: Jonna Pattillo

Jonna Pattillo — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 05:53:11 +0000

And Paul was always far kinder to me that I ever deserved.

By: Jonna Pattillo

Jonna Pattillo — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 05:52:19 +0000

I think Janet about covered most of it. I just wish we could stop attending funerals together

By: Marcia Killingsworth

Marcia Killingsworth — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 04:58:42 +0000

Keith, I think Doug Monroe’s piece is the ultimate Hemphill profile. I especially love this Hemphill quote Doug had in the story: I think just plain people who write, report, they’ve seen enough that if they’re human, they’ve got to be liberal.

You said it!

I was privileged to meet Paul through my step-father and mom — Bobby Dews Sr. and his beloved “Miss” Margie — and my step-brother Bobby Dews Jr, who was with the ATL Braves forevah. Bobby Sr. played for the Crackers — he was the “Barefoot Catcher of Baseball” — and Paul loved his stories. Bobby Jr. is a terrific storyteller. They all shared a lively sense of humor, a love of words and stories, and their battle with alcohol. And they all came out on the other side.

I grew up in Edison, Georgia, reading his columns in the Atlanta Journal and gasping at the world he revealed. When I met him, he was very kind to an aspiring journalist/writer.

Reading all the tributes has inspired me to re-read all of his books… I just wish he’d had time to write more.

My prayers and love go to Susan and all of his family. He will be missed by so many…

By: janet ward

janet ward — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 04:38:12 +0000

If I had to come up with one word to describe Paul, it would be “gentle.” Always soft-spoken — sometimes I had to ask him two or three times to repeat his last sentence — he was as kind and unassuming as anyone I have ever known. He would spend time listening to and nodding knowingly at people he really didn’t have much use for, people who thought that knowing a great writer, however well, put them into some rarified zone. I couldn’t have done it. Many times I would ask Susan how he managed, and she would say, “That’s just the way he is.” She knew him, and she was right.

When he got sick and couldn’t eat much, I would bring him warm pans of my mother’s recipe for homemade banana pudding. Susan said he loved it, so I kept doing it. But I know Susan, and I know that she is kind enough to say that whether or not it was true.

We (Paul, Susan and I) spent many a Saturday watching college football — usually involving Georgia, but occasionally, we would go slumming and watch an Auburn game for Paul’s benefit — at Manuel’s. If Georgia happened to win, Susan and I had a thing where we would stand up and sing the Alma Mater (From the hills of Georgia’s northland beams thy noble brow…) It entertained the few other UGA fans in the back room, none of whom knew the words, and it amused the hell out of Paul, who, I think was just happy that there was another person as nutty as his wife.

Paul lived a life befitting a brilliant Southern writer — he drank too much (before he quit), smoked too much (ditto) and, basically, lived large. Susan, whom I love like a sister, probably extended his life by a good few decades. Their home in Toco Hills was warm and inviting, and I spent some happy times there, as did many of you.

When someone dies, you often hear, “I never heard him say a bad word about anyone.” It’s usually crap. But in Paul’s case, it was true. The man was constitutionally incapable of being mean. It wasn’t in him. He was a sweet soul. Gentle. I think “gentle” is a word that has gone out of favor. But I can think of no word that more describes Paul Hemphill.

I loved him because he was everything I am not, although (I think) he liked me for that very reason — I am not gentle or sweet and I do not suffer fools gladly, which, God bless him, he was able to.

I know that now, my life is a little poorer, because I don’t have Paul in it.

By: Dallas

Dallas — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 02:02:17 +0000

Oh my. Good story. Good man. Sad news. Including for so many of us (like me) who had lost track of Paul in the last few years. I remember his columns, his great book Long Gone, and in whatever book it was, an acutely vivid description of a long haul driver, whether his father or a fictional character, I can’t remember. Indeed, a great loss.

By: jeff cochran

jeff cochran — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 00:19:40 +0000

Paul’s differences with his Father were well documented (by him, of course!). But I remember back in 1979 he was at Oxford Books for a book signing to promote “Long Gone.” The gathering was small but in came his parents, Mom and Dad proud of their talented son. Then came his wife Susan and their daughter. Despite the small crowd, everything became quite festive. I was quite aware of the things that tortured Paul, but it was also quite obvious that much brought him great joy. He was a great Southern Writer. He could describe our region’s busy streets as well as our quiet, distant places. Paul Hemphill set quite a standard.