The “sepia artwork and lyrical prose” in this graphic novel biography “beat with a love for Guthrie’s music and America’s beauty” (Guardian, UK). Using the sepia tones of the Dust Bowl as his palette, author and artist Nick Hayes tells the story of world-famous folk singer and songwriter Woody Guthrie. The tale starts in the 1920s when Guthrie was a teenager supporting himself in dried-up, post-boomtown Oklahoma. Picking up a harmonica and eventually a battered guitar, Guthrie finds solace in the ancient lineage of folksong. Hayes charts the musician’s course from Oklahoma and Texas towns ravaged by dust and the Depression to boxcars, factory farms, and the migrant camps of California, highlighting Guthrie’s dedication to singing American folk tunes and creating his own modern classics along the way. Hayes ends his portrait in 1940, at the pivotal time when Guthrie makes his way to New York and writes “This Land Is Your Land,” his iconic anthem tinged with both optimism and clear-eyed reality.

Icone du mouvement folk des annees 1960, Woody Guthrie est ne en 1912 en Oklahoma. C'est une figure emblematique de la musique populaire americaine. Apres une enfance marquee par d'innombrables tragedies, Woody doit, des l'adolescence, vivre de ses talents de musicien, en jouant dans la rue. Chasse par la misere, il s'installe en Californie au debut des annees 30 ou il acquiert son statut de chanteur contestataire en s'opposant aux milices des entreprises fruitieres de l'Etat.Sa reputation d'agitateur lui vaut nombre de demeles avec la police et la justice. Dans cet esprit, il compose une ballade en l'honneur de Tom Joad, le heros des raisins de la colere de John Steinbeck dont il partage les combats. Dust Bowl Ballads, enregistre a New York en 1940 est son plus celebre album. A cette epoque, il emmenage a New York ou il s'impose comme le plus fameux -Protest Singer-de Greenwich Village.Il decede le 3 octobre 1967, vaincu par la maladie de Huntington. Son folklore protestataire a exerce une influence majeure sur des artistes comme Bob Dylan, Joan Baez ou Bruce Springsteen.Ce magnifique album est une biographie romancee de la vie de Woody Guthrie, un homme engage, un poete, mais surtout le plus grand songwriter de tous les temps.Nick Hayes, son auteur, vit dans l'est de Londres. Il a commence sa carriere comme dessinateur politique dans le quotidien -The Guardian-. Plusieurs fois prime pour ses romans graphiques, il est aujourd'hui l'un des meilleurs auteurs de BD, outre-manche."

Woody Guthrie's songs about the Dust Bowl Migration and the Great Depression give expression to one of the bleakest periods in the history of the United States, bearing witness both to the economic and political turmoil and to the human erosion of the 1930s. Following a New Historicist approach, this study, incorporating a variety of previously unpublished materials, sets out to reconstruct the social and cultural potential of Guthrie's songs by exploring their manifold and intricate relationships with the cultural environment in which they were composed and performed. As a result, Guthrie's songs are shown to be deeply ingrained in the decade's culture: they criticize the deplorable social and political situation at the time, make sense of the incomprehensible and hint at those responsible for the disaster, thus amplifying the unheard voices of the down and out. By revealing that Guthrie's oeuvre was not only culturally produced, but also culturally productive in that it took an active part in shaping, perpetuating or undermining elements and patterns of the decade's cultural knowledge, the study also sheds new light on the social and cultural significance of the sung word.

New York Times Bestseller Finished in 1947 and lost to readers until now, House of Earth is legendary folk singer and American icon Woody Guthrie’s only finished novel. A powerful portrait of Dust Bowl America, it’s the story of an ordinary couple’s dreams of a better life and their search for love and meaning in a corrupt world. Tike and Ella May Hamlin are struggling to plant roots in the arid land of the Texas panhandle. The husband and wife live in a precarious wooden farm shack, but Tike yearns for a sturdy house that will protect them from the treacherous elements. Thanks to a five-cent government pamphlet, Tike has the know-how to build a simple adobe dwelling, a structure made from the land itself—fireproof, windproof, Dust Bowl-proof. A house of earth. A story of rural realism and progressive activism, and in many ways a companion piece to Guthrie’s folk anthem “This Land Is Your Land,” House of Earth is a searing portrait of hardship and hope set against a ravaged landscape. Combining the moral urgency and narrative drive of John Steinbeck with the erotic frankness of D. H. Lawrence, here is a powerful tale of America from one of our greatest artists. An essay by bestselling historian Douglas Brinkley and Johnny Depp introduce House of Earth, the inaugural title in Depp’s imprint at HarperCollins, Infinitum Nihil.

Twenty-seven years in the making (1940–67), this tapestry of nearly two hundred American popular and protest songs was created by three giants of performance and musical research: Alan Lomax, indefatigable collector and preserver; Woody Guthrie, performer and prolific balladeer; and Pete Seeger, entertainer and educator who has introduced three generations of Americans to their musical heritage. In his afterword, Pete Seeger recounts the long history of collecting and publishing this anthology of Depression-era, union-hopeful, and New Deal melodies. With characteristic modesty, he tells us what’s missing and what’s wrong with the collection. But more important, he tells us what’s right and why it still matters, noting songs that have become famous the world over: “Union Maid,” “Which Side Are You On?,” “Worried Man Blues,” “Midnight Special,” and “Tom Joad.” “Now, at the turn of the century, the millennium, what’s the future of these songs?” he asks. “Music is one of the things that will save us. Future songwriters can learn from the honesty, the courage, the simplicity, and the frankness of these hard-hitting songs. And not just songwriters. We can all learn.” In addition to 123 photographs and 195 songs, this edition features an introductory note by Nora Guthrie, the daughter of Woody Guthrie and overseer of the Woody Guthrie Foundation.