“Atchafalaya Houseboat: My Years in the Louisiana Swamp” by Gwen Roland, Louisiana State University Press 2006, ISBN 9780807130896, Hard cover, 161 pages, $22.95
You know how a friend will recommend a book, and you really enjoy it, then your friend stays one jump ahead of you and recommends another book related to the first, and this one suddenly becomes one of your favorite books of all times? Well, that’s the way it is with “Atchafalaya Houseboat” and me. I can’t thank my friend Louis enough for introducing me to the engaging literature of life on the rivers and in the swamps of America.
Gwen Carpenter Roland deftly chronicles the incredible adventure she and companion Calvin Voisin lived for nearly a decade on a houseboat they built themselves, deep in the heart of Louisiana’s Atchafalaya River Basin Swamp. Early in the 1970s, Gwen decided to postpone beginning work on her doctorate in favor of living off the land (and the water). The pair simply walked away from civilization in their radical quest to live a simpler life.
Confident in the way that only youth can be, they built themselves a floating home made almost entirely from scavenged and recycled materials. Neither had an ounce of building experience; they gleaned their knowledge from a book, “How To Build Your Home in the Woods”, and assiduously studied the Foxfire books. The result was a sturdy if quirky houseboat, complete with brick fireplace and a library–a welcoming, sheltering spot for the many characters they encountered during their years in the swamp.
One of those characters was the renowned nature photographer C.C. Lockwood. Still a young man at the time they became friends, Lockwood shared the couple’s back-to-nature ethos, and brought many writers and artists and musicians to meet the people who lived on the Atchafalaya houseboat. Lockwood often returned to the swamp, capturing intimate and engaging photos of the couple in their everyday if radically alternative lifestyle. Fast-forward a quarter of a century to the day Gwen discovers one of Lockwood’s most famous photos of her and Calvin in a National Geographic collector’s edition publication. She’d been asked before to write the story of her time in the swamp; this was the sign she’d been waiting for.
The gritty details and breathtaking beauty of everyday life in a place where Mother Nature always has the upper hand are intertwined with snatches of stories and recollections of Gwen and Calvin growing up in the bayou communities of the Atchafalaya and the history of the area. From gardening and laundry to floods and foraging, Gwen offers a quiet, gentle and forthright telling of her hippie-era years in south central Louisiana practicing the same self-sustaining customs of their Cajun ancestors.
Read more about Gwen Roland and “Atchafalaya Houseboat” (which is the 2022 Louisiana One Book One Community selection) and watch the Louisiana Public Broadcasting film based on the book at https://www.lpb.org/programs/atchafalaya-houseboat.
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