Boyce Upholt is not Mark Twain. Any comparison to the literary icon would embarrass the New Orleans-based journalist.
But there are commonalities.
Both lived around Hartford, Connecticut — Upholt as a boy growing up in a nearby suburb, Twain as a world-famous humorist living in a steamboat-shaped house in the city. Both fell in love with the Mississippi River — Twain as a boy growing up in Hannibal, Missouri, Upholt as a journalist drawn to the river’s cultural, economic and environmental staying power.
Advertisement
The rest is history — literally — as Upholt’s decadelong reporting immersion into the lower Mississippi River basin arrived in bookstores last month, only shelves away from Twain’s nonfiction classic “Life on the Mississippi.”
