Texas Tech University Press -- The Line from Here to There

B O O K S
Click for larger image 04/2008. 160 pages 978-0-89672-630-7 $24.95 cloth "Rosanna Herndon’s stories hit the spot. For one unfamiliar with West Texas childhood, they take us clearly there. Then . . . we suddenly meet ourselves! The mirrors of human life, from dance lessons to dominoes, put us in touch with our own childhood and our own relations no matter when or where we did our own growing up. Read and remember!" —Donald Davis, author of See Rock City and Writing As a Second Language Coming soon: online ordering! In the meantime, please call 800.832.4042 or 806.742.2982 to order.		The Line from Here to There A Storyteller’s Scottish West Texas By Rosanna Taylor Herndon "The early Scottish West Texans are the real reason for these stories," says nationally award-winning teller and performer Rosanna Herndon. "I wanted others to know them. Their unpretentious lives marked a clear path for me and for generations to come." Herndon, who has been telling stories to audiences for more than a quarter of a century, had her first audiotapes released in the mid-1990s, at which time her daughter began urging her to write them down. Through her own family tales, Herndon began to study how such stories contribute to listeners’ concepts of self and family, what they reveal about communication patterns within families, and how they reflect who we are and who we wish to become. The eighteen stories collected here cover several generations of Scottish West Texans. Some are tales of Herndon’s own ancestors; others are of extended family and friends. They tell of life experiences that measured character and produced a distinctive toughness of spirit. Others are personal narratives of more recent history but also regional, reflecting a culture peculiar to the southwestern United States and specifically Herndon’s own West Texas. FROM THE BOOK "In the 1870s, a traveler finding his way west from Fort Worth followed the thin brown line, a barely visible wagon trail that stretched out in a great curve across West Texas. This was the route taken by George Kempton Ashburn. ". . . One night George camped at the abandoned Fort Phantom Hill. Where the brown line wound southward, he left the trail and rode northwest. He climbed the Caprock until he found a place he’d heard about but only half believed. There before him was a land that stretched from horizon to horizon, as level as his mother’s dining table. And over it all, an enormous canopy of bright blue sky. "No trail, no path, no houses or fences, no trees. He squinted. From where he stood to the very edge of the world, it seemed, was nothing but tall, shimmering grass. George loved its endlessness. He felt a kind of freedom he had never known before." Rosanna Taylor Herndon, professor emerita of communication at Hardin-Simmons University, is also a charter member of the Tejas Storytelling Association and founder of the Mesquite Storytellers of Abilene. She has been a featured teller and workshop presenter at festivals across the United States, including the National Storytelling Festival.

Home | Search | TTUP News | Books | Journals | About the Press | Contact Us | Privacy Policy | Site Map