Messages from My Father: A Memoir

Calvin Trillin, the celebrated New Yorker writer, offers a rich and engaging biography of his father, as well as a literate and entertaining fanfare for the common (and decent, and hard-working) man.

Abe Trillin had the western Missouri accent of someone who had grown up in St. Joseph and the dreams of America of someone who had been born is Russia. In Kansas City, he was a grocer, at least until he swore off the grocery business. He was given to swearing off things--coffee, tobacco, alcohol, all neckties that were not yellow in color. Presumably he had also sworn off swearing, although he was a collector of curses, such as May you have an injury that is not covered by workman's compensation. Although he had a strong vision of the sort of person he wanted his son to be, his explicit advice about how to behave didn't go beyond an almost lackadaisical You might as well be a mensch. Somehow, though, Abe Trillin's messages got through clearly.

The author's unerring sense of the American character is everywhere apparent in this quietly powerful memoir, Messages from My Father.

Author: Calvin Trillin
Publisher: Farrar, Strauss & Giroux-3pl
Published: 06/12/1997
Pages: 128
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.40lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.40w x 0.40d
ISBN: 9780374525088

Review Citation(s):
New York Times 08/24/1997 pg. 24
NY Times Notable Bks of Year 01/01/1997 pg. 97
Publishers Weekly 05/27/1997

About the Author

Calvin Trillin has been writing for The New Yorker for over 30 years. His many books include Tepper Isn't Going Out, Travels with Alice, Remembering Denny, Family Man, The Tummy Trilogy, Deadline Poet, and Too Soon To Tell.