Episode Notes

Memphis goes by many names – Home of the Blues, BBQ Capital, and the Bluff City. The last one a reference to our location on the Bluffs of the Mighty Mississippi River. But how much do you know about the muddy waters flowing in our backyard? Today I’m joined by Boyce Upholt, author of The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi. We talk about our own personal relationships to the water, some of the people and events that have shaped the river, and what the future may hold for the communities and ecosystems along its banks.

Boyce Upholt is a “nature critic” whose writing probes the relationship between humans and the rest of the natural world, especially in the U.S. South. His work has been published in the Atlantic, National Geographic, the Oxford American, and Virginia Quarterly Review, among other publications, and was awarded the 2019 James Beard Award for investigative journalism. He is the founder of Southlands, a newsletter field guide to Southern nature.

Previous episodes mentioned:Ep 112 Food Power Politics: The Food Story of the Mississippi Civil Rights Movement with Bobby J Smith IIEp 121 Crossings: How Road Ecology is Shaping the Future of Our Planet with Ben Goldfarb