Reading Portland is a literary exploration of the city's past and present. In over eighty selections, Portland is revealed through histories, memoirs, autobiographies, short stories, novels, and news reports. This single volume gives voice to women and men; the colonizers and the colonized; white, Hispanic, African American, Asian American, and Indian storytellers; and lower, middle, and upper classes.

In his introduction, John Trombold considers the history of writing about a place that has nourished a provocative and errant literary tradition for over 150 years. In the preface, Peter Donahue considers the influence of region--particularly Portland's urbanity and its hybrid population--on literature.

Included here are the voices of Carl Abbott, Kathryn Hall Bogle, Beverly Cleary, Robin Cody, Lawson Fusao Inada, Rudyard Kipling, Ursula K. Le Guin, Joaquin Miller, Sandy Polishuk, Gary Snyder, Kim Stafford, Elizabeth Woody, and many more.

John Trombold teaches at Linfield College in McMinnville, Oregon. Peter Donahue teaches at Birmingham-Southern College in Alabama and is the author of many short stories and books, including the novel Madison House. Together, they edited Reading Seattle: The City in Prose.

"It is the author's diversity of sentiment, style, and time period which creates an interesting and varied perspective on Portland, and ultimately gives the reader great insight into the city's history."

"[A]ny literate person who loves Portland will enjoy and profit from the readings in this book. Reading Portland is an investigation of the nature of a place, an inductive exploration into the character of a city done with an instrument called prose. Any Portlander who loves this city should have Reading Portland on his or her shelf in order to read and reread tales of the tribe that lives at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers."

"John Trombold and Peter Donahue's Reading Portland: The City in Prose could be used as an urban history of the Rose City; but more effectively, it is a celebration of Portland's urban life..This collection of authors is superior to any other urban anthologies I have found. I cannot help but wonder if Trombold and Donahue envision a City in Prose series..I anxious await Reading Chicago, Reading Boston, and Reading Las Vegas."