Hugh Martin explains how his essay from our spring issue, “See the Lady,” was sparked in part by a book he discovered that made him resee some of his own experiences.
—Fort Knox, Kentucky, June 2002 Army Basic Training: we march and sing cadence everywhere we go. The chow hall. The motor pool of tanks. The obstacle course. Whether the march lasts two minutes or two hours, we sing, and depending on the drill sergeant, the cadence can involve anything from love of army to homesickness, …
This essay describes a letter lost to modern English but also flora and fauna now gone from both England, birthplace of the language, and West Virginia, a landscape shaped by loss.
(To read the entire excerpt posted here, use the arrows on the bottom left-hand side of the PDF embedder tool.) To read the rest of the excerpt in Issue 18.1, you can purchase a copy in our online store. Digital copies only $5.