HIGH POINT, N.C., July 8, 2009 – Dr. Ed Piacentino, professor of English at High Point University, recently published his latest book, titled “C. M. Haile’s ‘Pardon Jones’ Letters: Old Southwest Humor from Antebellum Louisiana.”
The book, published by Louisiana State University Press, consists of the first collection of the 67 humorous dialect letters authored by Christopher Mason Haile, which were initially published in the New Orleans Times-Picayune newspaper between 1840 and 1848.
Piacentino, who has worked on the book since the summer of 2003, explains that the Rhode Island-born Haile wrote under the pseudonym “Pardon Jones.”
“Haile’s letters, which are in the tradition of the popular antebellum southern newspaper humor genre, were set in three different locales – Louisiana, Massachusetts and Mexico,” Piacentino says. “Many of the Pardon Jones letters address national issues of the era, such as the tariff debate, boundary disputes between the United States and Canada, the controversy over a national bank, conflicts between state rights and nationalism, and the annexation of Texas.”
Piacentino notes that his edition of the letters written by Pardon Jones includes an informative and substantive introduction to Haile and his work, annotations to describe and clarify the many topical allusions, and a glossary to identify dialect words, phrases and references.
At High Point University, every student receives an extraordinary education in a fun environment with caring people. HPU, located in the Piedmont Triad region of North Carolina, is a liberal arts institution with 3,500 undergraduate and graduate students from more than 50 countries and more than 40 states at campuses in High Point and Winston-Salem. It is ranked by US News and World Report No. 5 among comprehensive universities in the South and No. 1 in its category among up-and-coming schools. Forbes.com ranks HPU in the top 6 percent among “America’s Best Colleges.” The university offers 66 undergraduate majors, 40 undergraduate minors and seven graduate degree programs. It is accredited by the Commission of Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, and is a member of the NCAA, Division I and the Big South Conference. Visit High Point University on the Web at www.highpoint.edu. Chris DudleyVice President for [email protected]