Storytelling Detroit

Mark Binelli is a novelist and Rolling Stone journalist who grew up in the Detroit area. He's since brought these three prongs -- literary, reportage, experience -- into his new book, Detroit City is the Place To Be: The Afterlife of an American Metropolis. I talked to him about the book in Sunday's Detroit Free Press. From that:

Q: What do you think urban journalism needs, especially in Detroit?

A: The hardest thing about writing this book was settling on one book. I had this idea of a nonfiction book as basically like writing 10-12 articles. I can do that; I know how to write 10 articles. But when you're reporting, you see that there are so many stories. Every morning I would religiously read the (Detroit) News and (Detroit) Free Press and some of the blogs, and so, as you know, there's always some crazy thing. That's ultimately why I had to get away to write this. I found myself wanting to write every story about Detroit, every book about Detroit.

I spent time with John Carlisle, also known as Detroitblogger John, and he just drives around -- that's his method (for finding stories). There are so many stories that are in forgotten parts of the city. There's so much emphasis on downtown and Midtown, and that's great, but it's just a small part of the story. ...

The book I think that needs to be written is an epic biography of (former mayor) Coleman Young. I'm just shocked that hasn't been done yet. Someone should do that before the people who knew him die.

The book is getting a healthy amount of media reverb. Ben Mathis-Lilley writes about in Slate (which is where the illustration above comes from).

The story of Detroit cannot be avoided dramatically or morally, but it has no ending.

As a writer, that might’ve stopped me, but it doesn’t stop Binelli. And fortunately, Binelli is a good storyteller, an entertaining historian, and an insightful commenter who is comfortable completely failing the requirements of the genres he’s working in. His stories don’t have a lesson; his history uncovers no new themes; his analysis does not lead to a constructive conclusion. ...

Does that sound boring? It’s not. Because while Detroit may have been in unpleasant stasis for 30 years, it is a strange, compelling stasis that traditional accounts and short visits to the city—however well-intentioned—almost never crack.

My own take on Detroit City is the Place to Be? Its greatest accomplishment is that it brings a literary language and vantage to a city that is hungry for it: the book opens with a quote from Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities, and its cohering metaphor is how people come to Detroit to see the future. Binelli is an author who is as honest as he can be, and he has a good eye for character. The book's lack, however, comes from a sometimes misplaced trust in what Binelli hears or reads -- for example, he recycles the old rumor that 47% of the city is illiterate, even though that statistic has been thoroughly debunked -- which results in some distention.

Regardless, people interested in rigorous and beautiful storytelling about the city should read Ingrid Norton's "Letter from Detroit" in the Los Angeles Review of Books.

Mark Binelli is reading from the book and talking shop with Detroit Free Press editorial page editor Stephen Henderson this week: 7pm, Friday, November 16, at Pure Detroit in the Fisher Building in the New Center neighborhood.

Comments

[Amy]

Just finished "Say Nice Things About Detroit" by Scott Lasser. Have you read it? I'm curious what you think, and/or if there's been any buzz over there about it.

[Anna Clark]

Yeah, I had the chance to interview him about that for the Free Press, but there wasn't space there to detail my thinking on it.

The short story is that I think the novel has a lot of good observation and storytelling sense, and I found the author to be thoughtful and honest. The novel wasn't really my taste, though: I found it thin and heavyhanded. An odd detachment percolates. Some of this isn't Lasser's fault: the conventions of its genre just don't appeal to me, but I think many other people will like it a lot.

It did get some buzz:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/29/books/say-nice-things-about-detroit-scott-lassers-new-novel.html?_r=0

http://www.bookforum.com/review/9963

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/oct/5/book-review-say-nice-things-about-detroit/?page=all

http://www.sfgate.com/books/article/Say-Nice-Things-About-Detroit-by-Scott-Lasser-3689388.php

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20121009/ENT05/210090309

What do you think, Amy?

[Ingrid Norton]

The illiteracy thing may have been a rumor, invented around the war on drugs, or at least before hip-hop in the 1980s.

The historical peak for fires in Detroit, where there were still fires the last time I checked, was around 1990.

Thanks as always, Ms Isak