To Write a Legend: Neal Hutcheson on Writing The Moonshiner Popcorn Sutton

[This interview first appeared in the March/April 2023 issue of Writer's Digest.]

If you ask Neal Hutcheson how long it took him to create his book, The Moonshiner Popcorn Sutton, the answer could be two years, or it could be 20 years. It depends on the framing.

By trade, Hutcheson is an Emmy Award–winning documentary filmmaker whose works are focused on “documenting heritage in transition,” and it was the work he did on one such film—2004’s Mountain Talk about language and culture in Southern Appalachia—that introduced him to the man would ultimately become the subject of several additional documentaries: Popcorn Sutton. Hutcheson filmed and interviewed Sutton extensively about Sutton’s illegal moonshine distilling and distribution business until Sutton’s death in 2009, and it’s from those experiences that this book was created.

“The purpose of this book,” Hutcheson writes in his introduction, “was—in the beginning—to preserve an authentic memory of who he really was, without the hype. That is not to say that the legend attached to his name is not meaningful and interesting in its own right, but it has almost completely eclipsed the actual person I had the privilege to know.”

It’s at least partially due to that hype around Sutton’s larger-than-life persona that Hutcheson chose to independently publish. “I did have some interest from some university publishers in the subject,” Hutcheson told WD. “My conversations with them, however, made me realize that it wasn’t the book that I wanted to make, and it was important for me that this book exists. So, I knew that in order to have the book that I wanted and to have as much control as I wanted over how the book came out, that I would have to do it myself.”

Hutcheson knew from his work on documentary films that creating a documentary-style book wasn’t going to be easy. But that knowledge not only allowed him to make an informed decision about what publishing route to take, it abled him to decide what he wanted to do himself and what he’d need help with. “I had to learn a lot of new skills. I had a vision for the book, and I wanted to do the layout. … I did the design, but I’m not a designer. And on the tail end, I worked with a great designer over in Durham named Dave Wofford. And he gave me guidance on what I had done, like ‘picture larger here, more space for the text’ and things like that. Little things that I never would’ve been able to figure out on my own. … So, I’m proud of how much I figured out on my own, but I definitely needed an experienced designer and bookmaker to get me over the finish line.”

That investment in learning new skills and working with a professional designer more than paid off. The book is a remarkable achievement. It’s a 240-page coffee-table book of stunning photos, the majority of which were made by Hutcheson while he was filming the documentaries. They’re perfectly paired with the story of Popcorn Sutton’s life told via interview excerpts from the documentaries, plus additional research and memories from Hutcheson.

Hutcheson writes in the book that more of his own writing appears in it that he originally intended in part thanks to an early reader, a friend and film professor who asked about the lack of detail about Sutton’s personal life. Hutcheson initially thought, “that was a part that he held back from me and so it wasn’t within my purview.” But on further reflection, “I was doing a disservice to these people who had been a part of his life by not talking about that, and also not giving a fuller sense of who he was, because I didn’t want to hold back on the bad aspects of him, which he did have.” The book is richer, and the life of Popcorn Sutton is more vividly rendered with the inclusion of these details.

Following the interviews are three essays for further reading to put Sutton’s story into context: “In the Pale Moonlight: A Brief History of Moonshine,” “Our Contemporary Ancestors: The Hillbilly in Hindsight,” and “Mountain Talk: Translation & Transcription.” It’s that third essay about Appalachian English that demonstrates the level of care Hutcheson took when transcribing the interviews with Popcorn Sutton.

He writes in part, “Transcribing Popcorn’s speech into the text that appears in this book has greatly diminished the character of his speech … Much of his personality is conveyed in cadence, tone, and emphasis, most of which does not translate well to the page. Furthermore, the way speech is rendered has implications worth considering. ‘Mountain talk’ has long been used (usually incorrectly) in cartoons and literature in ways that depict the speaker as folksy and uneducated, a fact that made me hesitate over the unintended message in a faithful transcription of Popcorn’s speech. Would trying to preserve the character of his voice produce a respectful portrait of a highly intelligent man who not only read the paper every day, but also wrote a book? However, the alternative—converting his speech to ‘Standard English’—does little to respect him either.”

When asked at what point in the process of creating the book did he realize he needed to include an explanation of how he approached the transcription, Hutcheson explained, “… Since I had done documentary work on the same subject, I’m used to having his voice in my ears, and then in translating it to the page—all of a sudden you realize we’re talking about a nonstandard dialect, and you realize that you are, as the person who’s transcribing it, being asked to make a lot of decisions that are much more actually important into how the subject is perceived [by the reader] than you realize until you get to that moment of transcription …”

The time, care, and intention put into writing, designing, and transcribing the book won Hutcheson the Grand Prize in the 30^th Annual Writer’s Digest Self-Published Book Awards, along with a National Indie Excellence Award and an Outstanding Book—Independent Spirit Award from the IPPYs (Independent Publishers Book Awards); it was also a finalist for the Next Generation Book Award.

For Hutcheson, these awards not only serve as a way to continue marketing the book post-publication, but they also confirm his dedication to all aspects of the quality of the book was worth it. “The biggest thing for me personally,” he says, “is the kind of affirmation that these awards provide and encouragement for doing these kinds of projects. Not just a reward for doing them, but it kind of keeps me going to the next project to realize, like, Yeah, people will look at this. You’ll find your audience and it takes work and you have to be all-in to it, but the universe will respond if you put your heart into it.”

Finding that audience is part of what made the whole independent publishing process worthwhile: “I would definitely underscore that it’s a lot of work and be prepared for that. … I would say … my weak area is self-promotion and that has to be a part of it too. I mean, that’s a big part of the equation. Once you’re done with the book, in a way, you’re just starting. But on the other hand, if I get your interest today and you’re asking me questions and I get to talk about my experience with the book, or I get to present it in a bookstore or in a group, that’s just been so rewarding.”