Come Home Charley Patton

the long version

Come home Charley Patton is a memoir documenting the Civil Rights Era and contemporary southern culture. Ralph Lemon's research on the African American experience intertwines personal anecdotes and family remembrances with diaristic accounts of the making of a dance, as Lemon journeys the mythic roads of migration- visiting the sites of lynchings, following the paths of Civil Rights marches, and meeting the descendants of early blues musicians. Come home Charley Patton is a rich, transcendent text, and a historically-charged meditation on memory in America. Illustrated with family photos, original art, and photos of the performance.