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Photo by Calvin Voisin, courtesy of Gwen Roland

Memoir as Archive

This year's OBOC title, 'Atchafalaya Houseboat', is an engrossing account of a bygone way of life in Louisiana today.

For the sixteenth annual One Book One Community series at East Baton Rouge Parish Library, Gwen Roland's memoir Atchafalaya Houseboat: My Years in the Louisiana Swamp shows readers what it was like to live in the Basin wilderness. Through the OBOC initiative, the library and its local partners encourage patrons of all ages to read the chosen title, and hosts events designed to facilitate a cultural conversation around that year’s literary pick.

Upon receiving her master's degree, Roland was set to pursue a PhD program when a summer experiment turned into nearly a decade isolated from civilization on an old barge in Bloody Bayou, self-sufficient in growing their own food, raising livestock, fishing the Basin's waters. 

Visual mediums like photography and film are primarily responsible for introducing Roland's story to the world. The library's lineup of events also includes an assortment of children's programming, as well as presentations on the roots of Acadiana's native swamp pop, Cajun, and Zydeco music. 

See below for programming highlights:

  • Sunday, March 20: View a screening of the LPB Documentary, Atchafalaya Houseboat. Produced by Christina Melton, who has won an Emmy Award, the Alfred I. Dupont-Columbia Award for Excellence in Journalism, and the Edward R. Murrow Award.
  • Sunday, April 10: 'Des Cris de Joie': Roots of Music on the Atchafalaya features a presentation from Dr. Stuart Tully of Nicholls State University, tracing the international roots of Cajun, Zydeco, swamp pop, and other musical genres from the Bayou Region. Main Library.
  • Saturday, April 16: Attend a screening of the award-winning LBP documentary Against the Tide: The Story of the Acadian People, which tells the story of the Acadian people from their origins in France, their immigration to Nova Scotia in 1604, their expulsion and eventual relocation to South Louisiana. It also looks at the battles to keep the Cajun culture alive and efforts to preserve the French language in Louisiana. Among the Cajun musicians who appear in the film are Zachary Richard (who also narrates), Dewey Balfa, and Beausoleil's Michael Doucet. Zachary Branch.

For more information on One Book One Community and the event listings at library branches across the parish, visit readonebook.org.

Sponsored by East Baton Rouge Parish Library