{"id":21335,"date":"2015-10-02T14:00:06","date_gmt":"2015-10-02T19:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/?p=21335"},"modified":"2015-10-02T05:02:48","modified_gmt":"2015-10-02T10:02:48","slug":"harrison-scott-key-to-speak-as-part-of-apsus-visiting-writer-series","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/2015\/10\/02\/harrison-scott-key-to-speak-as-part-of-apsus-visiting-writer-series\/","title":{"rendered":"Harrison Scott Key to speak as part of APSU\u2019s Visiting Writer Series"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AustinClarksville, TN<\/strong> – \u201cThe South is a strange place, one that can\u2019t be fit inside a movie, a place that dares you to simplify it, like a prime number, like a bible story \u2026 like my father.\u201d<\/p>\n

Born in Memphis and raised in Mississippi, Harrison Scott Key knows a thing or two about life in the South \u2013 and the unique people that call it home.<\/p>\n

Much like the South, Key\u2019s father was also one-of-a-kind. The author, comedian and university professor\u2019s new book, titled \u201cThe World\u2019s Largest Man: A Memoir\u201d tells the story of a bookish boy, sharing a house with a father who often seemed at odds with the society his son embraced.<\/p>\n

\"Harrison<\/a>

Harrison Scott Key<\/p><\/div>\n

Key will stop by Austin Peay State University on October 8th at 8:00pm to read from his work in room 303 of the Morgan University Center. The event, which is free and open to the public, is part of the APSU Visiting Writers Series. A reception and book signing will follow.<\/p>\n

The book describes a boy playing and learning with pious, Bible-reading southern men and women \u2013 all while being raised by a man who only truly felt comfortable when hunting, fighting or just plain escaping from civilization.<\/p>\n

\u201c(My father was) a man better suited to living in a remote frontier wilderness of the nineteenth century than contemporary America, with all its progressive ideas, and paved roads, and lack of armed duels. He was a great man, and he taught me many things: How to fight, how to work, how to cheat, how to pray to Jesus about it, how to kill things with guns and knives and, if necessary, with hammers,\u201d Key remarked.<\/p>\n

Key, with his love of books and excessive interest in hugging, couldn\u2019t have been less like his father, and that pushed him to focus on being everything he was not. While his father shunned society, Key came to embrace it, becoming an actor, a Presbyterian and a doctor of philosophy.<\/p>\n

But when it was time to settle down and start a family of his own, Key started to view his father in a new light, and realized\u2014for better and for worse\u2014how much of his old man he\u2019d absorbed.<\/p>\n

Amanda Winfree of Zone 3 Press, APSU\u2019s literary journal, reviewed \u201cThe World\u2019s Largest Man,\u201d praising Key for his insightful and cognizant thoughts on the absurdity of just how much he\u2019d become like the man he once shunned.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo describe this book as hilarious would be both true and a terrible understatement. It\u2019s a goldmine of visceral humor but also of careful observation and profound gratitude,\u201d Winfree wrote.<\/p>\n

For more information on Key or the APSU Visiting Writers Series, contact Susan Wallace at wallacess@apsu.edu<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clarksville, TN – \u201cThe South is a strange place, one that can\u2019t be fit inside a movie, a place that dares you to simplify it, like a prime number, like a bible story \u2026 like my father.\u201d Born in Memphis and raised in Mississippi, Harrison Scott Key knows a thing or two about life in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[26859,23,1355,17887,262,3284,825,1992,26857,3334,7857,8243,26858,1363,2438],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4xGYI-5y7","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21335"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21335"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21335\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21336,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21335\/revisions\/21336"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}