J.W. Burleson photo / Boquillas del Carmen, Coah.

PHB

My photo
Brooklin, Maine, United States
We own a 1975 GMC Sierra Grande 15 in Maine and a 1986 Chevrolet Custom Deluxe 10 in West Texas. Also a pair of 1997 Volvo 850 wagons. Average age in the fleet is 28 years--we're recycling. I've published 3 novels: THE LAW OF DREAMS (2006), THE O'BRIENS (2012), and CARRY ME (2016). Also 2 short story collections: NIGHT DRIVING(1987) and TRAVELLING LIGHT (2013). More of my literary life is at www.peterbehrens.org I was a Fellow at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study for 2012-13. I'm an adjunct professor at Colorado College and in the MFA program at Queens University of Charlotte. In 2015-16 I was a Fellow at Harvard University's Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. The Autoliterate office is in Car Talk Plaza in Harvard Square, 2 floors above Dewey Cheatem & Howe. SUBSCRIBE TO THE AUTOLITERATE DAILY EMAIL by hitting the button to the right.

Sunday, April 28, 2013

1967 Le Sabre. Moncton. Not Williamsburg


Brilliant blue day walking around the street of Moncton, N.B. with an old friend. That kind of April daylight makes the colors pop, and it was just the season in New Brunswick when guys are getting their old machines out of barns, sheds, and garages. I had not planned on liking Moncton. It isn't particularly stately, or quaint, like some other towns in the Maritimes. But it has a liveliness that you don't see much in American cities that small and that remote. Maybe it's an Acadian thing. The downtown really is a downtown, with traffic on the streets and the sidewalks, and all kinds of things going on. Streetlife. Doesn't happen in Bangor, Maine, or Colorado Springs. either. The Canadians have done something right with their cities. If Moncton were in the U.S., it would have been ringed with a freeway by the early seventies. And those "urban renewal" projects were often enough to knock an old town off its feet.
My favorite Acadian band? That's easy-- Les Hay Babies.




I figured a storefront like Isaac Lawson, Stylish Clothiers could only exist in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, where it would be tiresomely ironic. Or in Moncton, where it's wonderful.

1 comment:

  1. So glad that you like Moncton - I too am a fan! Hope that the Frye festival has been good. Your new book is really wonderful!

    Sarah MacLachlan

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