In Search of Lake Wobegon

I was what you would call a "Noobie" to all of Garrison's work until recently. I picked up this book at a college library after speaking to my mother about the Minnesota author project I was recently assigned. She was familiar with his work and suggested that I look into it....so I did. I never thought that this would open up such big can of worms, and I mean this in a good sense. After reading the book from cover to cover, I went on the internet to find out more about Garrison's work and turned up some very interesting search results. I then read it again and now I guess you could say that I'm hooked on the Lake Wobegon saga and I am planning on picking up a couple of his earlier writings related to Lake Wobegon.I really enjoyed reading this book and I would recommend this book to anyone who has vast, little, or no knowledge of Lake Wobegon.

From the Central Minnesota prairie, in beautiful black and white pictures and picturesque prose, here is the Genesis of Garrison Keilor's magical mythical Lake Wobegon, site of "A Prairie Home Companion." Here we get to *see* the strong women, good-looking men, and above average children of and for whom he speaks on Saturday nights. Accompanying Richard Olsenius' stunning photography (how can the viewer not be deeply moved by the picture of the veterans at the St. Wendell cemetery on Memorial Day?) are excerpts from the Radio Show, interviews with inhabitants, and essays and musings from Keilor - like this: "Culture isn't decor, it's what you know before you're twelve. It sticks with you all your born days. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree. You can try to wrestle free of it, like those geese who trail the V-formation, trying to look as if they aren't part of this bunch, as if flying south were a personal decision on their part, but your feint towards independence only makes it clearer who you really are. Some people like hot dish better if it's called cassoulet, or pot roast if it's pot-au-feu. Fine. Suit yourself. Same difference." Whatever you call those culinary delights, you'll like this book. Come see Father Kleinschmidt's Annual Blessing of the Snowmobiles. Ja, you betcha! Reviewed by TundraVision.

Correction please to posted review dated December 10...two words were dropped from the lead sentence. please correct if you will to include "has given voice..." The full sentence should read: "For years Garrison Keillor has given voice and vision to Lake Wobegon, a mythical wonderland somewhere in the heartland."Many thanks for fixing...My father will be delighted to know I still have verbs properly placed in my writing. All the best for the holidays...

For years Garrison Keillor has given voice and vision to Lake Wobegon, a mythical wonderland somewhere in the heartland. Now for the first time we can see the place and its people through the eye of Richard Olsenius, whose essentialist photography magnificently illuminates Keillor's words in their first collaborative book "In Search of Lake Wobegon."Olsenius' 4x5 images provide deep and penetrating insights into people who, as Keillor writes: "...learned long before we are twelve that God loves us but God also says hard things that a person doesn't care to hear.""Here," writes Keillor "the currency is character, as expressed in stories." As always, Keillor tells great stories. Olsenius marries character and image -- expressive, haunting, and essential. Together they bring flesh to the word and word to the flesh."In Search of Lake Wobegon" was on press long before September 11. Yet, its images are not only prophetically timely, but reflective of a durable and distant homeland. Turn to page 44 and pages 64, 69, 74, 86 and 89 - images far from ground zero but deep in the heart. It is both reassuring and haunting to see our oneness from the remoteness of Avon, Holdingford, New Munich and St. Joseph. There's the fishing hole, the fields, and the field of dreams, the homecoming parade, St. Rosa's church and on page 106, Gary Thelen at the bean-finishing machine. Keillor tells that Thelen's Swany White Flour Mill has been in the family since 1906. Through Olsenius I met, saw and let Gary touch me. Keillor introduces the Holdingford High homecoming court on page 30 in the words of young Queen Tanya: "like wow" and "Cool" and the football game that wasn't. On the facing page Olsenius delivers a stark image of Tanya and nine other Holdingford royals. I was taken aback, then pushed forward, and awed. What will become of Tanya and her ambition to build houses? I don't know. Even so the image, the hope endures. On page 46, the prairie I knew so well as a schoolboy - a winterscape of woeful Wobegon - is set against the page 47 meditations of Father Emil Dworshak:"It's time to take a close look at yourself and how you are conducting your life and have a truthful moment in the midst of all this damn entertainment." "In Search of Lake Wobegon" takes a close look and offers a truthful moment. Thanks Richard. Thank you Garrison.

I was tearful after reading only the first paragraph of this book. Since my move from Minnesota to the east coast 3 years ago, I have come to miss "home" very much. Garrison Keillor's radio show is good medicine for those of us who have strayed too far, but this book brought me closer to Minnesota than I've been in a long time. Keillor's words are such a comfort, and he weaves such a fantastic history (and present) that is such a perfect mirror image of life and culture "up north." The black-and-white pictures are so familiar, though I've never visited any of the people or places in them. Pictures of main street parades, farms, dirt roads (hey, some of us haven't seen a dirt road in ages), and small-town nighttime hangouts are among the images found in this book that remind me of where I come from. Minnesota will always be my home, and this book will always remind me of who I am. I STRONGLY recommend this book. Whether you're a resident or a visitor, the words and pictures in In Search of Lake Wobegon will make you sigh and laugh and remember. This isn't just a coffee table picture book. The essays will astound you...you'll wish you had a paperback to show to your friends. Makes a great gift!