I can't stop thinking about Hurricane Katrina. I can't stop thinking about the helpless victims, the tragic loss of life, and the thousands of stranded inhabitants of New Orleans who are struggling to survive in a city that has no electricity, no running water, and a broken network of communications. It's heartbreaking.

I'm also saddened by the devastation that has struck the Crescent City (as New Orleans is also known). Its vibrant neighborhoods, lush gardens, and bustling bistros are now drowning like Lego blocks in a bathtub full of water from Lake Pontchartrain and the Mississippi River. What future awaits this beautiful city and its rich architectural and literary trails?

Since it was founded in 1799, New Orleans has had a long tradition of being a hub for artists, musicians, and writers. Tennessee Williams, Oscar Wilde, Walt Whitman, William Faulkner, Zora Neale Hurstron, and Anne Rice were all attracted to her hum, colors, and textures. Once they walked her fragrant streets, they couldn’t help but beg New Orleans to adopt them, to accept them into her fold. For these writers—and many, many more, New Orleans is more than a city. She is a Muse, an endless source of inspiration for stories filled with mystery, intrigue, desire, adventure, and rich characters.

In poems, stories, and essays, authors have described their New Orleans with words that drip with love and reverence.

Listen to the words of William Faulkner:

The violet dusk held in soft suspension lights slow as bell strokes, Jackson Square was not a green and quiet lake in which abode lights round as jellyfish, feathering with silver mimosa and pomegranate and hibiscus beneath which lantana and cannas bled and bled. Pontalba and cathedral were cut from black paper and pasted flat on a green sky; above them taller palms were fixed in black and soundless explosions. 

Mosquitoes – 1927

Those of Greek writer Lafcadio Hearn:

…The glamour of New Orleans strongest upon those whom she attracts to her from less hospitable climates, and fascinates by her nights of magical moonlight, and her days of dreamy languors and perfumes. There are few who can visit her for the first time without delight; and few who can ever leave her without regret; and none who can forget her strange charm when they have once felt its influence.

And those of Tennessee Williams reflecting on his life in The Big Easy:

In New Orleans I felt a freedom. I could catch my breath here.

The same streets that helped Williams catch his breath also inspired his masterpiece, A Streetcar Named Desire. It was at 632 St. Peter Street that he first heard "that rattletrap of a streetcar that bangs up one old street and down another." Soon after, he began writing the play that has moved generations.

It is said that the streets of New Orleans resound with the sound of Williams’ main character Stanley Kowalski’s scream. "Stellllllaaaa!" he shouts, kneeling, sweaty and desparate in a French Quarter courtyard.

I've always wanted to visit New Orleans and walk the streets haunted by Stanley Kowalski’s shouts. I've dreamed of strolling through the Garden District and the historic French Quarter with Dr. Kenneth Holditch’s Literary Tour. I've wanted to hang out in a café, to treat myself to a cup of dark coffee and a platter of beignets, to learn some Creole, and to take in deep breaths of Mardi Gras spirits.

Will I ever have the chance? I don’t know.

The only thing I know is that in the uncertain days that are to follow, I will console myself with the words of author Cleanth Brooks who once astutely said:

New Orleans has become one of the cities of the mind, and is therefore immortal.