Stones Stand, Waters Flow

About the Book

Stones Stand, Waters Flow is a story of change and endurance.

The Perkins farm, where the author spent his boyhood, stood as a silent monument to history. Hancock and Adams had fled there from Lexington, assisted in their escape by a widow, a minister, and a slave. The barn where they stabled their horses contained the horse and cow and farm implements of the author’s childhood. Their flight path through the family’s woods remained a logging trail and a favorite childhood playground. Perkins family lives were colored by history and enriched by legends of English, Scottish, Welsh, French, and Indian ancestors. The period from 1930 to1950 included also the stresses of economic depression, wartime, and a mother’s breakdown, as the slow seasons of the past hastened toward the swift transformations of the future.

About the Author

George Perkins’s most recent book is Stones Stand, Waters Flow, a memoir and history. Forthcoming is the 12th edition of The American Tradition in Literature, written with Barbara Perkins, fifty years in print and one of the favorite college textbooks of all time. Others include The Reader’s Encyclopedia of American Literature, Women’s Work, and Contemporary American Literature. He has taught in the United States, Scotland, Australia, and China, and has been a Senior Fulbright Fellow at the University of Newcastle in Australia and Fellow of the Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities at the University of Edinburgh. He and Barbara are honored in the name of The Society for the Study of Narrative Literature’s annual Perkins Prize for the Best Book in Narrative Studies. For additional information see www.georgeperkins.net.