{"id":1235,"date":"2005-09-06T10:34:44","date_gmt":"2005-09-06T17:34:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp\/2005\/09\/the_big_easy_blues\/"},"modified":"2005-09-06T10:34:44","modified_gmt":"2005-09-06T17:34:44","slug":"the_big_easy_blues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/2005\/09\/the_big_easy_blues.html","title":{"rendered":"THE BIG EASY BLUES"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Turns out we weren&#8217;t the only ones to note <a href=\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/archives\/2005\/09\/the_eulogies_ar.html\" class=inline target=new\"><strong><font color=#003399>James Lee Burke&#8217;s take<\/strong><\/font><\/a> on New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. Chicago Trib columnist <a href=\"http:\/\/www.chicagotribune.com\/sports\/chi-0509010144sep01,1,2787853.column\" class=inline target=new\"><strong><font color=#003399>Mike Downey cited it<\/strong><\/font><\/a>, too. So did <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kansascity.com\/mld\/kansascity\/news\/local\/12537813.htm\" class=inline target=new\"><strong><font color=#003399>Barbara Shelly in The Kansas City Star<\/strong><\/font><\/a>. And yesterday USA Today got hold of the prolific Louisiana novelist for his thoughts about Hurricane Katrina&#8217;s damage to the city&#8217;s cultural heritage.<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/exec\/obidos\/tg\/detail\/-\/0743449193\/ref=olp_product_details\/104-8180488-8402323?%5Fencoding=UTF8&#038;v=glance\" class=inline target=new\"> <img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Burke's 1988 novel.jpg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/archives\/Burke%27s%201988%20novel.jpg\" width=90 align=right border=0 \/><\/a> &#8220;I&#8217;m not sure the city can come back,&#8221; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/life\/2005-09-05-katrina-rebuilding_x.htm\" class=inline target=new\"><strong><font color=#003399>Burke told USA Today<\/strong><\/font><\/a>. He &#8220;believes the flood merely exacerbated the city&#8217;s decades-long spiral of descent and social deterioration from illegal drugs, crime and government neglect,&#8221; reporter Gary Strauss wrote. CNN news executive Kim Bondy, a New Orleans native, is pessimistic, too. &#8220;It&#8217;s so steeped in culture,&#8221; he said. &#8220;But now I feel like that spirit is broken. The thing that hurts me so deeply is that these are things you can&#8217;t rebuild and you just can&#8217;t get back.&#8221;<br \/>\nLeave it to James (&#8220;Ragin&#8217; Cajun&#8221;) Carville, though, to draw the opposite conclusion: &#8220;No one forgot how to play the saxophone or how to cook or write,&#8221; he says. &#8220;Or have a good time. That&#8217;s all still there. Calamities and disasters are part of New Orleans&#8217; history. This too shall pass.&#8221;<br \/>\n<i>&#8212; Tireless Staff of Thousands<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Turns out we weren&#8217;t the only ones to note Mike Downey cited it, too. So did &#8220;I&#8217;m not sure the city can come back,&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1235","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-main","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbvgEs-jV","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1235","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1235"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1235\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}