This article needs additional citations for verification .(September 2012) |
The View from Pompey's Head is a novel by the American writer Hamilton Basso, first published by Doubleday in 1954. It spent 40 weeks on The New York Times bestseller list. The book is set in the fictional small town of Pompey's Head, South Carolina.
The book was reprinted by the Louisiana State University Press in 1998 as part of its "Voices of the South" series. Both The View from Pompey's Head and its prequel, The Light Infantry Ball (1960), were finalists for the National Book Award for Fiction.
The book was reviewed positively in 1954 by The New York Times: "Zestful and non-escapist entertainment... The most pleasantly and sensibly romantic novel to come my way in a long time." and by the Saturday Review : "His most impressive book to date. A long, mildly ironic, and deliberately discursive work, it weaves two of his favorite subjects, the subtle social distinctions of a small Southern city and the subtle questions of reputation and standing in New York literary and publishing circles."
Inez Hollander Lake, in her biography of Basso, wrote "Comfortably placed on The New York Times bestseller list for 40 weeks, selling more than 75,000 copies, and sold to the movies for $100,000, The View from Pompey's Head was the breakthrough that Basso had been waiting for. However, just as one cannot argue that Melville's Typee (1846) was a better book because it sold more copies than Moby-Dick (1851), so it is equally impossible to claim that The View from Pompey's Head was a masterpiece because it was so popular." [1]
James Sallis, writing in The Boston Globe , commented: "What it did was gather up, like a self-anthology, themes and preoccupations from Basso's earlier work: the return-of-the-native motif so important to at least three previous novels, his ongoing investigation of old vs. new South, his penchant for both the novel of character (Relics and Angels, Courthouse Square) and the novel of ideas (Days Before Lent, Wine of the Country). Its tale of a lawyer defending a black man is a direct precursor of, almost certainly a model for, To Kill a Mockingbird . [2]
Basso's novel was sold to 20th Century Fox for $100,000. The 1955 film was written and directed by Philip Dunne. Exterior shots and some interior shots of the video adaption were filmed in Savannah and Brunswick, Georgia. The story begins when the Manhattan attorney Anson Page (Richard Egan) returns to his Southern roots after 15 years, arriving in Pompey's Head, South Carolina, to investigate the mystery surrounding missing royalties due famous author Garvin Wales (Sidney Blackmer). In the small Southern town, Page sees the same problems of racial and class prejudices that had once prompted him to leave Pompey's Head. However, he also encounters his former flame, Dinah Blackford (Dana Wynter), who has married the businessman Mickey Higgins (Cameron Mitchell). While their romance is rekindled, various secrets of the past rise to the surface.
The child actors Charles Herbert and Evelyn Rudie were in the cast, along with DeForest Kelley. Elmer Bernstein provided the music score. Released November 4, 1955, the film was retitled Secret Interlude in the UK. Marjorie Rambeau received a Best Supporting Actress Award from the National Board of Review.
The film was made for $1.23 million [3] and earned an estimated $1.5 million at the North American box office in 1955. [4]
Baton Rouge is the capital city of the U.S. state of Louisiana. Located on the eastern bank of the Mississippi River, it had a population of 227,470 as of 2020; it is the seat of Louisiana's most populous parish (county-equivalent), East Baton Rouge Parish, and the center of Louisiana's second-largest metropolitan area, Greater Baton Rouge.
The "Bonnie Blue flag" was a banner associated at various times with the Republic of Texas, the short-lived Republic of West Florida, and the Confederate States of America at the start of the American Civil War in 1861. It consists of a single, five-pointed white star on a blue field. Its first use being as early as 1810, it is considered the first lone star flag in U.S. history.
James Lee Burke is an American author, best known for his Dave Robicheaux series. He has won Edgar Awards for Black Cherry Blues (1990) and Cimarron Rose (1998), and has also been presented with the Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America. The Robicheaux character has been portrayed twice on screen, first by Alec Baldwin and then Tommy Lee Jones.
Southern United States literature consists of American literature written about the Southern United States or by writers from the region. Literature written about the American South first began during the colonial era, and developed significantly during and after the period of slavery in the United States. Traditional historiography of Southern United States literature emphasized a unifying history of the region; the significance of family in the South's culture, a sense of community and the role of the individual, justice, the dominance of Christianity and the positive and negative impacts of religion, racial tensions, social class and the usage of local dialects. However, in recent decades, the scholarship of the New Southern Studies has decentralized these conventional tropes in favor of a more geographically, politically, and ideologically expansive "South" or "Souths".
Joseph Hamilton Basso was an American novelist and journalist.
Interstate 10 (I-10), a major transcontinental Interstate Highway in the Southern United States, runs across the southern part of Louisiana for 274.42 miles (441.64 km) from Texas to Mississippi. It passes through Lake Charles, Lafayette, and Baton Rouge, dips south of Lake Pontchartrain to serve the New Orleans metropolitan area, then crosses Lake Pontchartrain and leaves the state.
Louisiana Highway 2 (LA 2) is a state highway located in northern Louisiana. It runs 189.49 miles (304.95 km) in an east–west direction from the Texas state line southwest of Vivian to a junction with U.S. Highway 65 (US 65) near Lake Providence, just west of the Mississippi state line.
Louisiana Highway 82 (LA 82) is a state highway located in southern Louisiana. It runs 142.87 miles (229.93 km) in a general east–west direction from the Texas state line east of Port Arthur to the Vermilion–Lafayette parish line southwest of Youngsville.
Louisiana Highway 6 (LA 6) is a state highway located in western central Louisiana. It runs 54.52 miles (87.74 km) in an east–west direction from the Texas state line southwest of Many to U.S. Highway 71 (US 71) and U.S. Highway 84 (US 84) in Clarence.
Louisiana Highway 14 (LA 14) is a state highway located in southern Louisiana. It runs 100.10 miles (161.10 km) in an east–west direction from the junction of U.S. Highways 90 and 171 in Lake Charles to LA 182 in New Iberia.
Louisiana Highway 22 (LA 22) is a state highway located in southeastern Louisiana. It runs 71.15 miles (114.50 km) in a general east–west direction from the junction of LA 75 and LA 942 in Darrow to U.S. Highway 190 (US 190) in Mandeville.
Louisiana Highway 26 (LA 26) is a state highway located in southwestern Louisiana. It runs 75.86 miles (122.08 km) in a northwest to southeast direction from a junction with the concurrent U.S. Highways 171 and 190 southeast of DeRidder to LA 14 in Lake Arthur.
Lyle Saxon was a writer and journalist who reported for The Times-Picayune in New Orleans, Louisiana. He directed the Federal Writers' Project Works Progress Administration (WPA) guide to Louisiana.
Louisiana Highway 55 (LA 55) is a state highway located in Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana. It runs 14.09 miles (22.68 km) in a north–south direction from a dead end south of Montegut to a junction with LA 24 in Klondyke.
U.S. Highway 65 (US 65) is a part of the United States Numbered Highway System that spans 966 miles (1,555 km) from Clayton, Louisiana to Albert Lea, Minnesota. Within the state of Louisiana, the highway travels 100.77 miles (162.17 km) from the national southern terminus at US 425/LA 15 in Clayton to the Arkansas state line north of Lake Providence.
Louisiana Highway 72 (LA 72) is a state highway located in Bossier City, Louisiana. It runs 2.49 miles (4.01 km) in an east–west direction from the intersection of Barksdale Boulevard and Hamilton Road to a junction with the concurrent U.S. Highways 79 and 80.
Louisiana Highway 96 (LA 96) is a state highway located in southern Louisiana. It runs 19.54 miles (31.45 km) in an east–west direction from LA 182 in Broussard to LA 352 east of Catahoula.
The View from Pompey's Head is a 1955 American drama film, written and directed by Philip Dunne and based on the 1954 novel The View from Pompey's Head by Hamilton Basso. The film stars Richard Egan, Dana Wynter, Cameron Mitchell, Sidney Blackmer, Marjorie Rambeau and Dorothy Patrick. The film was released on November 4, 1955, by 20th Century Fox.
Huey Long, governor of Louisiana and US Senator, has inspired or been portrayed in numerous cultural works. He has served as the template for fascistic politicians in novels like It Can't Happen Here (1935), A Lion Is in the Streets (1945), and All the King's Men (1946). The latter two were adapted into Oscar-winning films.
Thomas Lawrence Connelly was an American historian and author who specialized in the Civil War era. He is perhaps best known for his book, The Marble Man: Robert E. Lee and His Image in American Society, one of the most scholarly and critical books on Robert E. Lee.