What I Read in 2023: Wright Thompson
For someone who calls themselves even a lowercase-w-writer, reading anything that Wright Thompson puts out is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, his brilliance and perfect word choices can inspire you to put more effort into your craft. At the same time, there’s a constant sinking feeling that even his throwaway lines are better than anything you could ever craft. I’m sure that when he heads to the Piggly Wiggly his grocery list is both whimsical and deep.
This year I read Thompson’s “Pappyland,” which held my attention and got consumed in two total sittings, despite the fact that it was about bourbon, something that otherwise doesn’t interest me in the least. I know that I have a short attention span for anything outside of my remarkably narrow set of concerns and obsessions, so his ability to keep me focused reflected not only a deep understanding of the story’s universality, but also an exceptional ability to convey those themes. He made me eat my vegetables and like them.
For my money, though, the best Thompson work that I read in 2023 was “Joe Montana Was Here,” his profile of the Hall of Fame quarterback that brought together his own upbringing, a deep understanding of Montana’s legacy – biological and historical – as well as Joe DiMaggio, Tom Brady and the Silicon Valley business scene. Those are a lot of different threads to tie into one clean garment, and he did it impeccably.
There’s one almost gratuitous story in there relating to “The Catch,” the famous Montana-to-Clark pass that anyone my age or older can immediately picture in their mind’s eye. It is so iconic of his team’s dynasty that the 49ers have a statue of it outside of their new stadium. Clark is dead now, but even from the grave, his partner in his greatest moment can still needle him with the reminder that “nobody called it ‘The Throw.’” That’s the line that summed up everything I needed to know about Montana, and Thompson could’ve dropped the mic there.
A big part of Thompson’s oeuvre involves writing about superstars trying to make sense of their second acts. “I profile famous and successful athletes for a living and almost no one understands that success is merely a currency to spend on one big purchase,” he wrote. To that end, he’s somehow managed to become embedded with otherwise uber-private individuals including Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods.
I’d love to see him work with a post-BPT Kevin VanDam, and while that topic might seem like small potatoes to someone who has covered the most famous athletes on the planet, I have no doubt that the son of Clarksdale, Mississippi would bring an authenticity and perspective that even those of us who swim more frequently in VanDam’s waters would find enlightening – if not humiliating that we had not had those thoughts ourselves.
Until then, note that Thompson has written remarkably about various forms of fishing. Here are a few worth checking out:
He also produced an ESPN E:60 feature about noodling for catfish.
There’s even a commemorative Pappyland Abel Fly reel.
