William Alexander Percy (1885–1942)

The author was the son of a Mississippi power broker and Senator and uncle of Walker Percy. Pieces of this book were interesting, but on the whole it was a bit dull and racist in a paternalistic manner. The author could have perhaps been a great man had he not been born rich. As it was he was over-educated and rather idle. In the book he discusses his childhood, his education at Sewanne and Harvard, and his time in World War One. The two chapters on the war were the most engaging. Occasionally the author prattles on about flowers and opera.
His views on race are surprising to read now, but not unexpected when taken in context of his time and class. He expresses his feelings that blacks are inferior, jovial, charming, and amoral. He felt they were to be treated as the white race's little brother. Percy also manages to apologize for the original Klan and violence during and after Reconstruction. I would only recommend this book to those deeply interested in Mississippi or Walker Percy. It was all skillfully written and parts were interesting, but it was too long for a man who accomplished little.… (meer)

3694. Lanterns on the Levee: Recollections of a Planter's Son, by William Alexander Percy (read 7 Feb 2003) I have been wanting to read this since Jan 16, 1998, when I read Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America, by John Barry, which so prominently discussed it. It was published in 1941, the author, son of LeRoy Percy (U.S. Senator from Mississippi from 1910 to 1913), dying in 1942. This is an odd but fetching work. The book is of high interest when recounting the author's four years at the University of the South at Sewanee, Tenn., a year abroad, three years at Harvard Law, and in France in World War One. His account of his father's fight against the Ku Klux Klan in Greenville, Miss., is also of dramatic interest, as is the account of the great 1927 flood. This is a good book to read, even though one is appalled at the smart author's prejudice against Negroes--and one wonders what he would say today. This is a book full of interest and well worth reading.… (meer)