Man Killed by Pheasant

by John Price

The selection that follows is the introduction to the title story from Dr. John Price's memoir Man Killed by Pheasant and Other Kinships, which was published last year. The book won Orion Magazine's '2009 Readers' Choice Award.' Dr. Price is a UNO professor of English and teaches nonfiction writing.

"So I'm driving east of Highway 30, from our new home in Belle Plains to Cedar Rapids, Iowa. It's a four-lane, and because I'm an eldest child, I'm driving the speed limit, around fifty-five, sixty miles per hour. I'm listening to Jimi Hendrix cry 'Mary' – imagining, as usual, that I am Jimi Hendrix – when in the far distance I see some brown blobs hovering across the highway: one, then two. By the way they move, low and slow, I suspect they're young pheasants. As I near the place of their crossing . . ." read the entire essay

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