{"product_id":"tobacco-harvest-an-elegy","title":"Tobacco Harvest: An Elegy","description":"\"In 1973  James Baker Hall photographed these scenes and events of a Kentucky tobacco harvest. We look at them now with a sort of wonder  and with some regret  realizing that while our work was going on  powerful forces were at play that would change the scene and make \"history\" of those lived days  which were enriched for us then by their resemblance to earlier days and to days that presumably were to follow.\"Wendell Berry  from the book  An insightful meditation on the shifting nature of humans relationships with the land and with each other  Berrys essay laments the economic  political  and societal changes that have forever altered Kentuckys rich agricultural traditions. Berry also adds a deeply personal perspective to Halls eloquent visual testimony.  With a farm of his own nearby  Berry was a longtime friend and neighbor of the families shown in Halls pictures and took part in their work swapping. In addition to detailing the repetitive  strenuous labor involved in harvesting a tobacco crop  he relates memories of stories told  laughs shared  meals savored  and brief moments of rest and refreshment well earned.  Halls striking photographs illuminate the characters and events that Berry describes. During the 1973 harvest  he photographed the rows stretching toward the horizon while laborers cut a tobacco crop  one plant at a time  until the last row was cut  hauled  and housed in the barn. These photographs powerfully convey the physical experiences of a Kentucky tobacco harvest: the heat of the sun  the dirt  and the people hard at work.  James Baker Hall  former Kentucky Poet Laureate  is the author of many books  including The Total Light Process and Yates Paul  His Grand Fights  His Tootings.  Wendell Berry is a poet  a novelist  a farmer  a conservationist  and a former professor of English. His books include The Unsettling of America: Culture and Agriculture  Jayber Crow  Two More Stories of the Port William Membership  Life is a Miracle: An Essay against Modern Superstition  and Harlan Hubbard: Life and Work.","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44787742539829,"sku":"ByrdShop_0813123275","price":316.83,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/ByrdShop_0813123275_10c0f398-7a5c-425e-9ff5-9fc85476c992.jpg?v=1764878610","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/tobacco-harvest-an-elegy","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}