Fryar seamlessly weaves a fascinating history of racial, class, and gendered divisions that exist in and outside of Washington, D.C.’s quintessential worlds of interrelated nature and American (in)humanity.
— Marcie Cohen Ferris, coeditor of Southern Cultures journal and author of The Edible South
Potomac Fever
Reflections on the Nation’s River
As she walks the length of the Potomac River, clambering up its banks and sounding its depths, Charlotte Taylor Fryar examines the geography and ecology of Washington, D.C. with all manner of flora and fauna as her witness. The ecological traces of human inhabitancy provide her with imaginative access into America’s past, for her true subject is the origin of our splintered nation and racially divided capital.
From the gentrified neighborhood of Shaw to George Washington’s slave labor camp at Mount Vernon, Potomac Fever maps the troubled histories of the United States by leading us along the less-trafficked trails and side streets of our capital city, steeped in the legacy of white supremacy and colonialism. In the end, Fryar offers hope for how “we might grow a society guided by the ethics and values of the places we live.”
A compelling synthesis of historical, environmental, and personal narrative, Potomac Fever exposes the roots of our national myths, awash in the waters of America’s renowned river.
Ebook
- ISBN
- 9781954276352
Paperback
- ISBN
- 9781954276345
Events
Charlotte Taylor Fryar, author of Potomac Fever, at Lost City Books
Lost City Books welcomes Charlotte Taylor Fryar, author of Potomac Fever, for a book launch and conversation with Sonia Rao.
Free; RSVP requested
Charlotte Taylor Fryar, author of Potomac Fever, at People’s Book
People’s Book welcomes Charlotte Taylor Fryar, author of Potomac Fever, for a reading and conversation.
Free; RSVP requested
Charlotte Taylor Fryar is a writer, historian, educator, and herbalist. She holds a PhD in American Studies from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and lives in Glen Echo, Maryland, less than seven hundred feet from the banks of the Potomac River. Potomac Fever: Reflections on the Nation’s River (forthcoming from Bellevue Literary Press in March 2025) is her first book.
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