Tuscaloosa Nights... the real version... still not great

Okay, I know that this story is the original to the one we’ve already read and still my reaction is the same. I wasn’t overly impressed with this story. However, I do like the contrasts one can make between Carmer’s version and the plagiarized version. Carmer’s version, we’ll call it the ‘real one,’ gives a lot more detail to the Tuscaloosa area and strives to maintain that picture throughout out the story. I do wish the story would have helped define the time frame of the story. We know from the Ku Klux Klan scene what era this story takes place, but I would like to have seen the era through description – both of buildings, of the University, ect. For some reason, all I kept seeing was a modernized version of Tuscaloosa and the University – not a 1930s – 60s version.


I did like how the real one added more characters and gave those characters depth, unlike the last story we read. Yet I can’t help but want more descriptions of the University, since it is such a staple to the Tuscaloosa area. In comparison to the other story, I thought the plagiarism would occur ‘word for word’ like I have been taught it should. Instead, the plagiarism arrived as different ideas and scenes that each author made their own, for example the cross burning scene and the scene with Lula in the moonlight. I can see why the other story might be justified as plagiarism but I wouldn’t necessarily consider it plagiarism. Too me, both stories present similar ideas and scenes but in different contexts.

After reading this, I’m curious as to the rest of the novel. What other places in Alabama are feature in the book?