Appalachia North: A Memoir

by Matthew Ferrence

Appalachia North is the first book-length treatment of the cultural position of northern Appalachia—roughly the portion of the official Appalachian Regional Commission zone that lies above the Mason-Dixon line. For Matthew Ferrence this region fits into a tight space of not quite “regular” America and yet not quite Appalachia. Ferrence’s sense of geographic ambiguity is compounded when he learns that his birthplace in western Pennsylvania is technically not a mountain but, instead, a dissected plateau shaped by the slow, deep cuts of erosion. That discovery is followed by the diagnosis of a brain tumor, setting Ferrence on a journey that is part memoir, part exploration of geology and place. Appalachia North is an investigation of how the labels of Appalachia have been drawn and written, and also a reckoning with how a body always in recovery can, like a region viewed always as a site of extraction, find new territories of growth.

Genres: Memoir, Nonfiction, Essays

296 pages, Paperback

Published January 26, 2019

About the author

Matthew Ferrence is also known as Matthew J. Ferrence

Reviews

[Allison · Rating 5 out of 5]

Weaving the environmental with the personal, Ferrence makes an argument for his Appalachia (App-uh-lay-sha), which includes Pennsylvania and extends up into Prince Edward Island. While his Appalachia is different from my own (App-uh-latch-uh), I am drawn into his Whitmanian inclusiveness for this place that I both hate to love and love to hate (and cannot disconnect from my own identity). These new kinds of maps and metaphors ask his readers to push beyond stereotypes and surface meaning, to journey with him on this discovery, and to think about what it all means. I could not stop reading.

[Ann Otto · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the topics Ferrence chose to cover in this memoir related to place and his personal story of the return to his roots and medical challenges. I've been reading a lot on Appalachia and his realization of the differences between northern and southern Appalachia and how the cultures are different from the "real" American is helpful. Explanations of how even the geology and geography of the region effect it economically and otherwise is well described. A different sort of memoir, based in part on previously published essays, is worth reading. He makes it clear that this is a personal telling, not connected to the disagreements about the region which are appearing in other books that have arisen over J. D. Vance's Hillbilly Elegy.

[Becky Skillin · Rating 4 out of 5]

In stark contrast to Hillbilly Elegy and Educated comes this memoir of Northern Appalachia.

Ferrence deftly weaves personal experiences of growing up in Western Pennsylvania with the geography of the region by wondering how measurement, classification, and value determine home and knowing.
This work is interesting, funny, raw, and tender as it reflects on how a region shapes a life and how combined lives shape a region.

Augmenting the common understanding of what Appalachia is, Ferrence references those Appalachians who've gone before us to determine a region like Annie Dillard, Edward Abbey, Sean Prentiss in order to deepen our understanding of this swath of North America. This region is so much more than best-sellers have depicted.

"When I describe southwestern Pennsylvanians who wouldn't know they were in Appalachia, I am describing myself. I never thought of myself as Appalachian, not when I was young. We never talked about it. My friends didn't play mountain music....We didn't speak with twanging accents...or clog dance, or do anything that marked us as Appalachian. We didn't harbor feuds, make moonshine, or smoke corncob pipes....Certainly, my friends and I would have imagined those stereotypes when thinking of Appalachia, not realizing this was also us."

"My geology matters, makes me who I am, and I commit myself to reconciling with a relationship delivered to me already broken. The rocks forgive. The rocks remain. My way of looking at them and at myself may be unsettled but is at the very least ready."

Thank you, Matt, for outlining the complexity and injustice of stereotypes. We're all trying to make sense of our experiences and learning where we fit in this large universe. Your research and narrative help me make sense of my story as it intersects this area, too.

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Appalachia North is a quiet meditation on identity, place, and politics of a region in Pennsylvania that is sometimes called The Rust Belt, sometimes labeled as part of the Midwest, and often placed in the Appalachia region. Matthew Ferrence journeys through this part of Pennsylvania by not only narrating stories from his childhood, but by exploring the geography, the politics, and literature of this world. This book is a must read for anyone from Western Pennsylvania (I, too, grew up in Western PA, and currently live near the New York state border) but for anyone who lives in a place that defies neat labels and categories.

[Ashley Rose Delaney · Rating 4 out of 5]

An Important, Honest Read

In college, I studied Appalachian Literature as one of my electives. We read representative literature, and we read "representative" literature by people who are Appalachian. We learned how to tell the truth from the falsehood. No place is 100% bad, as J.D. Vance would have you believe. Ferrence recognizes the good and the bad. Part of why I enjoyed this book is the sense of home, placehood, and Ferrence's folk that we get throughout the entire book. His cancer plays a part. Living in different states, different countries, plays a part. He knows when he is home because he has been far from home. In finding the truth of where he is from, he learns the truth about himself.

[Earl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Insightful thought-provoking rumination on Appalachia, disease, rural identity and the elusive comforts of home.

[Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am enjoying this book. But I'm reading it in fits and starts. He moves back and forth in time in his narrative. I'm not sure it the book it so very 'jumpy' or if it's just my reading it that is giving me that impression.
Paused at page 114. Moving really cuts into my reading time...

I found that one of the books he quotes from is a favorite that got me started on a 'genre' I like. Memoirs/autobiographies about place and our sense of place, books like Staying Put: Making a Home in a Restless World by Scott Russell Sanders. So I took pictures of his bibliography; still need to read me some Wendell Barry.
Recommended.