Mark these words well, because this is the first – and quite likely last – time you will see them from me: Kudos to State Rep. Gino Bulso.
Bulso, a freshman Republican from Brentwood, has compiled an impressive record of legislative malpractice in his short time in office. More about that coming soon. But for now, the positive: Bulso has introduced a bill to designate Tennessee’s official state book.
And not content to stop there, he goes on to nominate nine others, apparently operating under the theory that more is more.
The subject vein has been mined before, with various efforts to designate the Holy Bible as the state’s choice. It took a veto by Gov. Bill Haslam to derail the effort in 2016, but it has continued to be resurrected, most recently in 2022.
(I’m more than a little surprised that a particular version hasn’t been specified. I know people for whom anything other than the King James might as well have been ghostwritten by Beelzebub.)
And, yes, Bulso includes a Good Book among his little library, the so-called Aitken Bible, the first one published in the fledgling United States, in 1782. The others are:
• Farewell Address to the American People, George Washington
• “Democracy in America,” Alexis de Tocqueville
• Papers of Andrew Jackson
• “Roots,” Alex Haley
• “A Death in the Family,” James Agee
• “All the King’s Men,” Robert Penn Warren
• “American Lion,” Jon Meacham
• “The Civil War: A Narrative,” Shelby Foote
• “Coat of Many Colors,” Dolly Parton.
You will note that not all of these books are, strictly speaking, books. Washington’s farewell, for example, was a valedictory letter he wrote near the end of his presidency. Jackson’s papers refers to the 12 volumes of a projected 17 being put together by the College of Arts and Sciences of the University of Tennessee to encompass Old Hickory’s entire literary output, including correspondence, memorandums and such.
Bulso vouches for each of his selections with a short description of its merit and Tennessee bona fides. Some of the connections are pretty thin: “All the King’s Men,” for instance, was written while the author lived in Tennessee, but it’s inspired by the life and career of the Louisiana “Kingfish,” Huey P. Long.
Washington’s address was written the year Tennessee entered the union. Not exactly a direct link.
It’s hard to beat the Dolly connection. She’s pretty much everybody’s favorite Tennessean, or should be. The catch is, her little picture book – just 32 pages – is aimed at ages 2 to 7, according to Amazon. Maybe it could be the official state children’s book.
Still, I credit Bulso with having started a conversation that opens the possibility that something other than the Bible can represent Tennessee. The operative question is, what book might best do the job?
Meacham’s “American Lion” is a fine biography of Andrew Jackson, perhaps Tennessee’s second-most-famous former resident. (Elvis.) But I don’t even know that it’s my favorite work by Meacham, a Tennessee native and Nashville resident. I lean toward his biography of Thomas Jefferson, though “American Lion” did win the Pulitzer Prize for Biography.
“Roots,” “A Death in the Family” and “All the King’s Men” also won Pulitzers, so there’s that. “Death,” according to Bulso’s bill, “provides a portrait of life in Knoxville, showing how the death of a father in a car crash affects the surviving family members.” “Roots,” it mentions, “is the most successful book ever penned by a Tennessean and one largely responsible for reviving popular interest in family history.”
But what does “Roots” say about Tennessee?
I’m no expert on the topic. But, as a displaced Mississippian, I think of William Faulkner as the kind of author indelibly identified with a state through tales of its people, history and culture. Reading him can certainly be challenging, as words and sentences ramble on and on and .... But he’s hard to beat as a state literary avatar.
Does Tennessee have someone of that stature who fits that bill?
I look forward to the comments from any and all, if Bulso’s measure makes it to a committee hearing. It would be nice to hear a legislative discussion about books that doesn’t revolve around the most effective ways to ban them.
Tiger names update: The Nashville Zoo settled on the names for its boy-girl-girl trio of Sumatran tiger cubs. They are Bulan, Zara and Kirana. I’d gone for Abu, Zara and Zaheera, so I was one for three.
Joe Rogers is a former writer for The Tennessean and editor for The New York Times. He is retired and living in Nashville.