The Minnesota State Fair

The Agriculture Horticulture building at the Minnesota State Fair, August 28, 2026. (Photo by Mark C. Taylor) 

It’s the end of August, which means it’s time for one of my favorite things: the Minnesota State Fair. 12 days of food, fun, and lots of people, ending on Labor Day. The State Fair has always been a bridge between the seasons: the last gasp of summer, and the entrance to fall and the beginning of the school year. 

The Minnesota State Fair boasts an amazing array of fried foods, animals, and events. There’s something for just about everyone, in my opinion. I am biased, since I’ve been going to the State Fair since I was a kid, and it’s a strong family tradition. I know the Fair doesn’t change much from year to year. Yes, the corn dogs and the pronto pups still taste the same. But there is a certain amount of comfort in the unchanging aspects of the State Fair. The giant pumpkins and the crop art are still in the same places in the Agriculture Horticulture building; the games on the Midway remain largely unchanged from season to season. But things do change at the Fair, and these gradual changes at the Fair seem to me an apt metaphor for life itself. Life usually doesn’t change rapidly, but most often the changes happen slowly, almost imperceptibly, not always measured day to day, but rather year to year.

Of course, the State Fair does change. One of my favorite areas of the Fair was called Heritage Square. It was built in the mid-1960's as a temporary area, but somehow it survived. Probably because no one cared about it. There were train cars full of circus and sideshow histories, a building about the history of the Fair with random memorabilia—it was truly a random catch-all area. You had to want to go to Heritage Square—because it was so hidden away, it was highly unlikely that you would just stumble across it. But eventually progress came for Heritage Square, and it was torn down and replaced by the fancier West End Market. The West End Market is pretty, smooth, and shiny, but for me it will never have the funky charm and odd character of Heritage Square. 

F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote a short story about the Minnesota State Fair. “A Night at the Fair” is one of a series of stories detailing the adolescence of Basil Duke Lee. Fitzgerald’s beautiful talent for description is on full display, especially in this passage:

“The first lights of the evening were springing into pale existence; the afternoon crowd had thinned a little, and the lanes, empty of people, were heavy with the rich various smells of popcorn and peanuts, molasses and dust, and cooking Wienerwurst and a not-unpleasant overtone of animals and hay. The Ferris wheel, pricked out now in lights, revolved leisurely through the dusk; a few empty cars of the roller coaster rattled overhead. The heat had blown off and there was the crisp stimulating excitement of Northern autumn in the air.”  

What a lovely passage. You can see everything that Fitzgerald describes. What I love about this passage is that Fitzgerald was calling it up in his memory bank at a time when he hadn’t lived in Minnesota for years. But it was all there in his brain, ready for use at any time. In the story, Fitzgerald describes a ride that Basil takes on “Ye Old Mill,” a “tunnel of love” ride that is now the oldest ride at the State Fair. You can still take a ride on “Ye Old Mill,” more than 100 years after Fitzgerald did so.

I still enjoy the State Fair, and now I get to see the Fair through the eyes of my children, which is quite enjoyable. Now they have their own favorite foods they must have, and their own things they want to do. And so, the cycle of the State Fair spins on, like a Ferris wheel, slowly rotating against the brilliant blue of the late summer sky. 

Book Review: Thomas Wolfe, by C. Hugh Holman, University of Minnesota pamphlets on American Writers

American author Thomas Wolfe's status in American literature was at a high level in 1960. That year, when Wolfe was profiled for the University of Minnesota's "Pamphlets on American Writers" series, the pamphlet about his life and work was number 6. The first 5 writers had huge reputations in 1960, and still do today: Ernest Hemingway, Robert Frost, William Faulkner, Henry James, and Mark Twain. While the numbering of the pamphlets is not meant to suggest a strict numerical ranking, the fact that Thomas Wolfe was number 6, as opposed to number 60, tells us something about the fine standing he enjoyed in 1960.  

Wolfe's critical standing has slipped since then. None of his novels were chosen for the 1998 Modern Library list of the 100 Best Novels written in English during the 20th century. The UK newspaper The Guardian made a splash recently with their list of the 100 Best Novels of all-time, and not only was Wolfe not on the list, none of his 4 novels received any votes from any of the 172 experts surveyed. Those of us who know and love Wolfe’s writing can appreciate his unique voice—he was an American original. To put it simply, I read Thomas Wolfe because there’s something in his writing that I can’t find anywhere else in literature.  

I attended, and spoke at, the annual meeting of the Thomas Wolfe Society last week in Wolfe's hometown of Asheville, North Carolina, and it was a pleasure to chat with so many fellow Wolfeans. There will always be an audience for Wolfe's style, even if it has gone out of critical favor. 

The author of the pamphlet on Thomas Wolfe was C. Hugh Holman, who edited The Short Novels of Thomas Wolfe and The Thomas Wolfe Reader. As much as Holman obviously admired Wolfe's work, he also critiqued Wolfe as well. At the end of the pamphlet, Holman writes that Wolfe's work had "an intensity and a beauty of language unsurpassed by any other American prose writer," but he also adds that Wolfe's novels contain "passages of very bad writing and of irrelevant action." (p.43)  

Holman does an excellent job outlining Wolfe's life and fiction in only 45 pages. One of the quotes that struck me the most was in a letter Wolfe wrote to his editor Maxwell Perkins in 1930: "I believe I am at last beginning to have a proper use of a writer's material: for it seems to me he ought to see in what has happened to him the elements of the universal experience." (p.25) I think Wolfe hit the nail on the head—what a writer chooses to write about will invariably be colored by their own autobiographical experience, but in order to craft something successful, they must be able to connect it to a larger whole.  

Holman writes about how in Wolfe's work "this vision of man possessed of tragic grandeur—essentially the vision of the nineteenth-century Romantic—is presented with great intensity." (p.41) I read that and nodded my head in agreement. And the quote made me think of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Both Wolfe and Fitzgerald were Romantics, with a capital R. The idea of tragic grandeur reminded me of this quote from a letter Fitzgerald wrote: "I am not a great man, but sometimes I think the impersonal and objective quality of my talent, and the sacrifices of it, in pieces, to preserve its essential value has some sort of epic grandeur." Leading Fitzgerald and Wolfe scholar Matthew J. Bruccoli titled his biography of Fitzgerald Some Sort of Epic Grandeur. Both Wolfe and Fitzgerald saw the individual in heroic terms. Both men had little use for most of the institutions of modern society: government, the military, business, organized religion, but they did not allow their dismissal of these institutions to turn into a bitter cynicism. There was still a Romantic optimism that the individual might be able to transcend this sordid plane of existence, if only for a brief, fleeting moment.  

Holman's pamphlet on Thomas Wolfe is an insightful study into this great American author. 

The Best Books I Read in 2025

I read 26 books in 2025, besting my Goodreads goal of 25 by one. Here are the best books I read in 2025, in no particular order.  

Look Homeward, Angel by Thomas Wolfe, 1929: Wolfe’s debut novel announced the arrival of a major new literary talent. Look Homeward, Angel drew heavily from Wolfe’s own life and childhood. Wolfe’s love of language is what animates and drives his writing. When Wolfe gives us a list of smells in the book, he doesn’t just stop at three or four; he keeps going and going for a page and a half. Look Homeward, Angel is a beautiful, messy, sprawling novel, bursting with life on every page. The characters are vivid; the prose is rich with energy and vitality. If you like Wolfe, you should also check out The Short Novels of Thomas Wolfe, and The Complete Short Stories of Thomas Wolfe. 

Deeper Blues: The Life, Songs, and Salvation of Cornbread Harris, by Andrea Swensson, 2024: A biography of Cornbread Harris, a fixture of the Twin Cities music scene who is now 98 years old, Deeper Blues details Harris’ life as a pianist and performer. The book also becomes a catalyst for the renewal of his relationship with his son Jimmy Jam, the famous songwriter and producer. Deeper Blues is funny, moving, and touching, an excellent example of how music can connect people.  

The Far Side of Paradise, by Arthur Mizener, 1951, and Scott Fitzgerald, by Andrew Turnbull, 1962: The first two biographies of the writer F. Scott Fitzgerald, both books are a fantastic look at the beautiful prose and disordered life of the brilliant chronicler of the Jazz Age. Mizener’s biography gives us glimpses of the charismatic Fitzgerald who entertained with card tricks and created fun and intricate games for children. Turnbull knew Fitzgerald in the 1930’s, when he was a boy, and Scott and Zelda rented a house from Turnbull’s parents. Turnbull’s biography paints a portrait of the man and his work, but it has a personal touch that makes it especially appealing. Turnbull wrote of him: “Fitzgerald focused on you—even riveted on you—and if there was one thing you were sure of, it was that whatever you happened to be talking about was the most important matter in the world. A further seduction was his smile—quick, tight, and very appealing. It was not so much a smile as a flash of confidence in you and your mortal possibilities.” I love how that quote makes Fitzgerald sound a bit magical, like Jay Gatsby. I also re-read The Great Gatsby in 2025, which of course I recommend as the starting point for anyone coming to Fitzgerald’s writing.  

The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, by Carson McCullers, 1940: A fantastic novel about a small town in the South. McCullers brings a sharp, discerning eye to her varied cast of characters. The center of the hub around which the characters revolve is John Singer, who is deaf and speaks only in sign language. Singer is a fascinating figure, he becomes a kind of priest-like figure to those he interacts with, offering them a silent absolution and benediction, while remaining an inscrutable figure himself. McCullers’ skill in writing the novel is how she is able to get into the heads of so many different characters and have them all ring true to life. A remarkable achievement.  

Tuck Everlasting: The Graphic Novel, based on the novel by Natalie Babbitt, adapted and illustrated by K. Woodman-Maynard, 2025: A superb adaptation of the classic young adult novel. Woodman-Maynard, who previously did a wonderful graphic novel adaptation of The Great Gatsby, has the gift of remaining true to the essence of a story while also successfully adapting it for a different medium. Tuck Everlasting is an interesting book, as it asks difficult questions about life and mortality. Woodman-Maynard's gorgeous watercolors are a perfect accompaniment for the pastoral beauty of the setting.  

Donald Trump on The Great Gatsby: a Satire

At a recent Oval Office media event, Trump spoke about F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel: 

"The Great Gatsby. Such a wonderful book. Really beautiful. You know, it’s a small book, not very long. Not too many pages. I’ve read it many times. So many times, I can’t even count. English professors they say, ‘how can you read it so many times?’ But I do. That Fitzgerald is really having a great year, I’m so happy for him. He’s getting so much attention right now. I'll have to give him a call.  

And the main character, Tom Buchanan, such a great guy. Terrific polo player, fantastic house. Those polo ponies of his, marvelous animals. Beautiful beasts. A beautiful wife and an even more beautiful mistress. So great, a lot of people would say that he’s living the dream. And he’s the only person who’s worried about the Nordics being replaced. He’s the only one who sees that. He gets it. He’s the kind of guy I love seeing at Mar-a-Lago.  

But it’s such a sad book. It’s a tragedy, really. A tragedy about how Tom Buchanan’s mistress gets killed. Seeing those dog biscuits made him so sad. 

Those parties are so fantastic. You know, I’ve seen Gatsby’s house. It’s a nice house, you know, for that time, for that era, but Mar-a-Lago is much, much bigger. There’s more gold-plated things here.  

Gatsby, you know, I don’t get him. Why does he throw all those shirts on the floor? Perfectly good shirts, and he’s throwing them all over the room. And a pink suit. I’ve never had a pink suit. Who wears a pink suit? Weird guy. You’ll never see me wearing a pink suit, I will guarantee you that. I guarantee you that. We have a lot of parties here, I should invite Gatsby, see if he likes the new ballroom. I think he’d like it; he’d be very, very impressed."

Trump then went on for 45 minutes about how Nick Carraway won’t make it as a bond salesman, and how he could easily beat Jordan Baker at golf.