The American South is full of paradoxes: it is one of the most hospitable, but also the less welcoming the world. The essays in this book constitute the impression of a man about several aspects of life, past and present in Dixie. He also talks about almost everything: race, politics, religion, literature and other cultural events. Some of the essays are biographical. Hobson feels particularly attracted to figures like H. L. Menken, Gerald W. Johnson, James McBride Dabas and Louis Rubin, social and cultural critics have explored the mind of the South, or literary writers as Richard Ford and Mary Mebane. The book concludes with two personal essays: exploring the lives of two members of her family, her grandmother and her great aunt, whose own stories reveal a lot about the South in their times and places.