When Madison Cooper published his novel “Sironia, Texas,” in 1952, it was, at the time, the longest English-language novel ever written. Its two volumes contained 1,731 pages and about 840,000 words.
According to an article at sciencedirect.com, the average person reads fiction at a rate of 260 words a minute, which means reading “Sironia, Texas” cover to cover will take about 54 hours.
“I saw some of the reviews from 1952 and ‘53 that basically said, ‘This is a book you have to sit with, this will take you weeks to read, this isn’t a fast-digesting novel,’” said Eric Ames. “So I think they were trying to generously say, ‘Don’t expect to hammer this out in a couple of days. You’re gonna have to be with this book for a while.’”
And now, 74 years after “Sironia, Texas” came out, Ames has made a commitment to be with this book for a while. In August, he began posting episodes of his podcast “Oh, Sironia!” in which he reads somewhere from seven to 10 pages from the book and then offers a short commentary on what he just read. He’s releasing about three episodes a week and estimates he’ll wrap up the project
in February 2028.
“What I talk about is if something in the passage that I read felt confusing to me, I can say, ‘OK, when this happens, this is what that means,’” he said. “And part of Cooper’s style that’s really hard to narrate is he has a lot of conversations that will overlap and sentences that will end in an em dash, because you can tell they’re being interrupted, or there’s a pause. There’s lots of dramatic pauses in here that you’re supposed to read in, but they’re at weird places, and they just feel awkward.”
Cooper’s novel is a fictionalized version of Waco in the early 19th century, and Ames became fascinated with Waco history when he moved here from Lubbock in 2005. He heard about “Sironia, Texas,” and finally found a copy for sale in Groesbeck for about $150, “which was not out of reach, but I was right out of school and working my first real job here at Baylor,” he said.
“And the cool thing about it is both (volumes) had their dust jackets, which is harder to find, and volume one was signed by Cooper, so I felt like it was worth it.”
“Oh, Sironia!” is Ames’ first venture in the world of podcasting, and one reason he chose the topic is because there is no audio book of “Sironia, Texas” that’s readily available.
“There is a version that was read to cassette back in the ‘80s that’s part of a library for people who have visual impairments,” he said. “I think there’s one copy at a library in Austin, so you can’t buy it.”
Preserving History
Eric Ames is the associate director for advancement, exhibits and community engagement for libraries at Baylor University. He holds a bachelor’s degree in public relations and honors studies from Texas Tech and a master’s in museum studies from Baylor.
“I’m our grant writer and grant coordinator, so I write or work with people who are working on grants to get them where they need to go,” he said. “And I help with other fundraising materials. I do marketing for the Texas Collection, Institute for Oral History and some of the things that happen in Moody and Jones (Libraries). And I’m responsible for the exhibits in the libraries.”
