the

THE NEWSLETTER OF THE CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF SOUTHERN CULTURE • FALL 2008 THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSISSIPPI From North to South and Back Again: Race, Religion, Reconciliation

eetings with Nobel Peace Prize winner John Hume and Mwith Judge Ronnie Palley of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission were highlights of a study abroad trip on the theme of Race, Religion, and Reconciliation, sponsored by the Trent Lott Leadership Institute in the summer of 2008. Center faculty member Charles Reagan Wilson, Kelly Gene Cook Sr. Professor of History and Professor of Southern Studies, and Southern Studies graduate student Rebecca Batey were among three faculty members and 18 graduate students who participated in the intensive monthlong trip. The project involved students from the University of Mississippi, the University Charles Reagan Wilson (left) and of Ulster in Northern Ireland, and Rebecca Batey in South Africa the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University in South Africa. Among the histories of racial and religious division participants met in Washington, D.C., planners of the trip were Robert Haws, but now are attempting to build mul- hearing from political and public policy chair of the department of Public Policy ticultural societies. Students explored offi cials and taking part in activities for Leadership, and Ruth Maron, from the theoretical models of reconciliation Independence Day. After discussions Study Abroad Offi ce. Lott Institute di- that might be used in different places and visits to museums and community rector Billy Gottshall accompanied the trying to overcome the burdens of the centers in Memphis, Jackson, and the group for the Northern Ireland part of past after open confl ict among groups Mississippi Delta, the group departed the journey. has ended. Students read comparative for Belfast in time to see the Orange The purpose of the program was to studies of these societies to prepare for Order parades that were once a fl ash- provide a select number of graduate the trip, focused on such issues as the point for violence between Protestants students the opportunity to consider politics of cultural memory, public reli- and Catholics in Northern Ireland. The the reconciliation process at close gion, economic development, the role troubles between these groups ended a hand, comparing the American South, of race and gender in leadership, and decade ago, and the group met people Northern Ireland, and South Africa, societal posttraumatic stress. three societies that have had traumatic The trip began in early July as all continued on page 36 the D IRECTOR’ S COLUMN Mississippi: The Open Society? Published Quarterly by The Center for the Study of Southern Culture The presidential debate has come and gone, and its success was an im- The University of Mississippi portant moment for the University of Mississippi. Preparation was inspired, guests Telephone: 662-915-5993 seemed to enjoy themselves and to leave saying positive things, the campus hosted Fax: 662-915-5814 E-mail: [email protected] visitors with an extraordinary range of interests and agendas, and the debate itself Internet: http://www.olemiss.edu/depts/south went off fi ne. The debate made me, as a Southern historian, think of James Silver. In the early IN THIS ISSUE 1960s Silver, the Civil War historian at the University of Mississippi, gave a fa- Fall 2008 mous lecture, “Mississippi: The Closed Society,” at the convention of the Southern 1 Race, Religion, and Reconciliation Historical Association and later published the piece in the Journal of Southern History 2 Director’s Column and as the fi rst chapter of a book with the same title. Silver argued that at certain 3 Living Blues News points in Mississippi history—the 1850s, the 1890s, and again in the 1950s—open 3 In Memoriam discussion was impossible, and the people with power were able to stifl e dissent and 4 Brown Bag Schedule: Winter 2009 debate. However, his main idea was not what many people see in the title—that 4 Gammill Gallery Exhibition Schedule everyone’s status in Mississippi was fi xed—but that the nature of life in Mississippi at 5 New SST Graduate Students Fall 2008 certain times made it almost impossible to express discontent, to identify problems, 5 Mississippi Reads 2008 and, since there were no publicly discussed problems, to discuss solutions. The issue 5 Sociology and SST Position Available that “closed” Mississippi to discussion was, of course, white supremacy, and Silver’s 6 Global South Faculty Group role was to combat both white supremacy and the general silence about it. 7 The Artists among Us 8 2009 F&Y Call for Papers The idea that societies were either closed or open resonated with post-McCarthy 9 Richard Wright Centennial Update period fears about American closed-mindedness and with post-McCarthy ideals that 11 2009 Natchez Literary Celebration welcoming multiple viewpoints and open discussion and debate could identify prob- 12 2009 Mississippi Delta Literary Tour lems and solve them. Historian C. Vann Woodward and political scientist V. O 13 2009 Oxford Conference for the Book, Key Jr. had only a few years earlier begun writing their works describing the worst Creative Writing Workshop features of Southern history as those that made it impossible for open political dis- 14 2009 Elderhostel Program, Registration cussion and competition to encourage coalitions among groups. For Key, the rise of Information about OCB, Workshop single-party, whites-only politics impeded any potential for the political system to 15 Walter Anderson and World Literature hear and respond to the concerns of the have-nots. Woodward argued that the end 16 2009 OCB Registration Form of fusion politics, with the rise of whites-only, Democrat-only politics in the 1890s, 17 Trenton Lee Stewart Selected as Fifth- Grade Author for Oxford Conference generated a new longing for old times not forgotten, new calls for the oppression of 18 Friends of the Center Membership Form African Americans, and, along with Key, a damaging silence about important issues. 19 Reading the South: Reviews & Notes For James Silver, as for Key and Woodward, what was best about American life was 26 New Volumes of The New Encyclopedia open discussion, dissent, debate, and the changes that could follow when most, or, of Southern Culture in an ideal world, all people’s views are open for expression. What was troubling 27 Southern Foodways Alliance News about the South was the lack of open discussion, in politics, on college campuses, in 31 Wharton Photographs to Help Gammill churches, almost anywhere. 32 Clarksdale’s 2008 Tennessee Williams All of this serves as background for life in Oxford in the weeks prior to the presi- Festival to Be on BBC Radio dential debate. I was not alone in wondering how open the University might be to 33 Call for Papers: Tennessee Williams the range of activities that were part of debating. The most important sign of change 34 MIAL Celebrates Its 30th Year, Calls for Nominations, Invites New Members is the simple point that the University wanted everything having to do with a big 36 Notes on Contributors presidential debate, from the interruptions and expense and celebrity guests to the 37 Southern Culture Catalog Items examination and self-examination. Above all, it wanted debate—something that was 40 Address Section/Mailing List Form/ not welcome in the closed society. Much of the attention has rightly concentrated on Friends Information and Form the issue of race, with virtually everyone noting the differences between the violence and hatred confronting James Meredith in 1962 and the welcoming respect Senator REGISTER STAFF Barack Obama received in 2008. Connected to the topic of race, one should take note Editor: Ann J. Abadie of the central issue of having political debates on campus. In previous decades, would Graphic Designer: Susan Bauer Lee the University of Mississippi have wanted, allowed, or courted a debate in which na- Mailing List Manager: Mary Hartwell Howorth tional politicians and the people who study and lobby them raised controversial issues? Editorial Assistant: Sally Cassady Lyon The celebration of debate seems, in itself, an important and positive thing. Lithographer: RR Donnelley Magazine Group At the University, the range of predebate discussions was impressive. To be honest, The University complies with all applicable laws regard- ing affi rmative action and equal opportunity in all its ac- I feared debate preparation might try to turn us all into cheerleaders for Mississippi. tivities and programs and does not discriminate against The University could have tried only to publicize signs of progress so much that it anyone protected by law because of age, color, disability, national origin, race, religion, sex, or status as a veteran looked like it was covering up its ugliest sides, past and present. Or it could have or disabled veteran. turned debate preparation into a pep rally for some of the traditions of student life.

Page 2 Fall 2008 The Southern Register But the University did neither. From administrators to faculty to students, Living Blues News alumni, and staff, the University of Mississippi did a serious job of encour- The Seventh Annual Blues Symposium, to be held February 26–28, 2009, at the aging open discussion. It hosted count- University of Mississippi, is entitled “Documenting the Blues.” Noted musicologist less events for talks and debates about David Evans will deliver the keynote lecture focusing on his extensive fi eldwork major issues—world and local hunger, with blues musicians. Panel discussions will focus on fi eld recording and blues record health, the press, the environment, in- labels and feature George Mitchell, Art Rosenbaum, Jim O’Neal, and others. Most ternational affairs, debating in political notably, on Friday, February 27, Living Blues and the Blues Archive will receive a history, gay and lesbian issues, econom- Blues Trail Marker from the Mississippi Blues Commission recognizing the maga- ic and labor issues, banking, the law, zine’s nearly 40-year history of documenting blues music culture. Later that evening, Southern and national politics, race the University hosts Mavis Staples at the Gertrude Castellow Ford Center. The and more race. Students had access to Symposium will also include live blues music on the Oxford Square and a wel- so much serious talking, questioning, come reception by the Highway 61 radio program. Additional details on the Blues arguing, and debating that they should Symposium will be announced in the next of Living Blues magazine as well as on our see that (if they did not already know Web site, www.livingblues.com. it) as what a good university is always  supposed to do. This predebate festival of discussion was, for the once-closed society, an important sign of opening. The current issue of Living Blues highlights At the time James Silver envisioned the Carolina Chocolate Drops, three young his concept, he was dealing with cen- musicians playing traditional string band sorship, strict oversight of who could music. The band recently played Nashville’s speak on campus, and angry legislators historic Ryman Auditorium and took part who were troubled by those whom they in Marty Stuart’s 50th birthday celebra- considered outside agitators. Through tion at the Grand Ole Opry. Additionally, changes in the legislators and adminis- Chicago bluesman Little Arthur Duncan trators, and in part through the efforts of details his life in the Chicago blues scene, countless people at the University who and over a dozen blues artists, including sponsor and run lectures and confer- Swamp Dogg and Honeyboy Edwards, ences and roundtable discussions, some- share their thoughts on the current presi- times on pressing moments of the day, dential race with our readers. sometimes on the most arcane subjects, A one-year subscription to Living Blues a new era has begun. Thoughtful and is $25.95, and blues fans can subscribe online at interesting people to speak and debate www.livingblues.com. A complimentary issue of Living Blues is also available to read- and meet students deserve their share ers of the Southern Register upon request. Simply e-mail info@livingblues and request of credit for making the University the a sample issue of the world’s most authoritative blues magazine. open place that universities should be. It may seem a long road from the fi rst Chancellor’s Symposium on Southern History and the fi rst Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference, back in the 1970s, to the McCain-Obama de- bate, but those events were part of a process of opening the University up to guests who talk in intelligent ways In Memoriam about important topics. For its part, the Center studied the Martha Glenn Stephens Cofi eld debate. Graduate students wrote pa- Oxford, Mississippi pers on how the press raised and an- November 23, 1935–September 29, 2008 swered questions about contemporary Mississippi, documentary students fi lmed and photographed events re- Charles E. “Chuck” Noyes lated to the debate, and undergraduate Oxford, Mississippi students had chances (sometimes with July 19, 1917–August 30, 2008 offers of extra credit) to attend an ex- traordinary range of events.

continued on page 4 The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 3 Center for the Study of Southern Culture

The University of Mississippi January 21 “South Apopka: A Community Portrait: A Gammill Gallery Talk” Brown Bag Lunch and Lecture Series Bob Michaels, Documentary Photographer January, February, and March 2009 Apopka, Florida The Brown Bag Luncheon Series takes place each Wednesday at noon in the Barnard Observatory Lecture Hall during the regular 28 “Oxford Film Festival: The academic year. Previews” Michelle Emmanuel, Molly Ferguson, and Micah Ginn, 18 “One Mississippi: Bringing March Coordinators College Students Together” 4 “Football Flashbacks: Classic Oxford Film Festival Melissa Cole, Undergraduate Film Footage from the Ole Miss Convener of One Mississippi Archives” February Micah Ginn, Producer Director, 4 “University Media Production 25 “Documenting the Blues at Ole University Media Production Film Projects” Miss” Joe York, Filmmaker, University Rebecca Batey, Eric Feldman, and Greg Johnson, Blues Archivist, Media Production Ferriday Mansel Special Collections/Williams Southern Studies Graduate Library 11 “The Second Strange Career of Students Scott Barretta, Host, Jim Crow” Highway 61 Blues Radio Will Hustwit, Instructor 11 “USpeak: Giving Voice to Mark Camarrigg, Managing Department of History College Students Editor Artair Rogers, Undergraduate Living Blues Magazine Coordinator of USpeak continued from 3

The University received so much good publicity that a little temperance might be in order. We at the University of Mississippi can certainly do far more than we do to use the power of univer- sity life to address the biggest problems in Mississippi and beyond. We can do even more to encourage discussion and welcome dissent and controversy, and we can do more to connect local issues Exhibition Schedule and our own fi eld of Southern Studies to issues throughout the world. We can also try to ask a broader range of questions October 20, 2008–January 16, 2009 than those raised by mid-20th-century Panny Mayfi eld white liberals like Silver and Woodward. All those are ongoing projects, often Juke Joints addressed by day-to-day hard work. But putting temperance aside, let’s be happy January 21–March 26, 2009 about this point: if the University’s role Bob Michaels in the presidential debate showed some- South Apopka: A Community Portrait thing important, it is that, if we use James Silver’s defi nition, Mississippi is no longer a closed society. The Gammill Gallery, located in Barnard Observatory, is open Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m., except for University holidays. Ted Ownby Telephone: 662-915-5993.

Page 4 Fall 2008 The Southern Register The Department of Sociology and Anthropology (www.olemiss.edu/ depts/soc_anth/) and the Center for David Wharton the Study of Southern Culture (www. olemiss.edu/depts/south/) at the University of Mississippi invite appli- cations for a tenure-track Assistant Professor position in Sociology with a joint appointment as James M. and Madeleine M. McMullan Assistant Professor in Southern Studies starting in 2009. We seek a sociologist of prov- en teaching and research ability in the areas of race and ethnicity whose work has relevance for understanding the experiences of minority groups in the contemporary U.S. South, and possibly the broader “global South.” We are particularly interested in can- didates whose work focuses on the African American context. Both the Sociology program and the Southern Studies program offer B.A. and M.A. degrees. While tenure and promotion reside in Sociology and Anthropology, teaching and service responsibilities New Southern Studies Graduate students pictured at Barnard Observatory in will be divided between the Center August 2008 are, left to right, front row: Blount Montgomery (undergraduate de- for the Study of Southern Culture gree, University of the South), Callie Flowers (University of the South), Duvall and the Department of Sociology Osteen (Rhodes College), I’Nasah Crockett (Sarah Lawrence College); middle row: and Anthropology. Ph.D. (or ABD Melanie Young (University of Southern Mississippi), Ferriday Mansel (University of status) is required at the time of ap- Mississippi), Alan Pike (University of North Carolina), Andrew Abernathy (University plication. Candidates should have an of Mississippi); top row: Bob Hodges (University of Georgia), Aaron Rollins active program of scholarly research, (University of Mississippi), Miles Laseter (Jacksonville State University). an interdisciplinary perspective, and a strong commitment to excellence in the classroom. Interested candi- dates should apply online at https:// jobs.olemiss.edu by submitting their curriculum vitae, letter of inter- est, one-page statement of teaching Mississippians are celebrating philosophy, evidence of teaching ef- Richard Wright’s centennial fectiveness, and outline of research year by reading and discuss- program. Use the appropriate links to ing his story collection Uncle attach these materials to the online Tom’s Children. For details, application. Three confi dential letters see www. mississippireads. of recommendation should be mailed org or e-mail mississippi- to Professor Kirsten Dellinger c/o The [email protected]. Department of Human Resources, Paul B. Johnson Commons, P.O. Box 1848, The University of Mississippi, University, MS 38677. The position will be open until fi lled or until an ad- equate applicant pool is established. Women and minorities are especially encouraged to apply. The University of Mississippi is an EEO/AA/Title VI/ Title IX/Section 504/ADA/ ADEA employer.

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 5 Global South Faculty Group

In August of 2005 a small group of fac- David Wharton ulty formed an interdisciplinary work- ing group around the topic of the Global South. Sponsored by the University’s Offi ce of Research, the working group met regularly to discuss readings that situated the American South relative to other locations in the hemisphere and around the world. That group has now expanded its membership to 25 profes- sors who represent the Croft Institute for International Studies; the Trent Lott Leadership Institute; the William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation; the departments of African American Studies, English, Gender Studies, History, Modern Languages, Music, Philosophy and Religion, Political From left, George Dor, Bashir Salu, Walter Mignolo Science, Sociology and Anthropology,

David Wharton and Romance Studies and Professor of Cultural Anthropology and Spanish, as well as academic director and cofound- er of the Center for Global Studies and the Humanities at Duke University. His topic was “Why Are We Interested in the Global South?: Second Thoughts on the Geopolitics of Knowledge and Colonial Difference”; he sketched the- oretical questions fundamental to see- ing beyond political borders at the same time that we remain attentive to the power those borders have historically asserted. On the morning following their addresses, Levander and Mignolo met with the working group to discuss a From left, Katie McKee, Caroline set of selected readings and the lectures Levander, Annette Trefzer from the previous evening, as well as to share their institutional experience in creating interdisciplinary projects and Southern Studies; and the schools tural, and theoretical study, was held around global themes. of Education, Journalism, and Social in Barnard Observatory on September The working group will convene Work. Additional sponsors include the 18–19, 2008, and featured two pub- regularly between guest lecturers to College of Liberal Arts and the Offi ce lic lectures. The fi rst was by Caroline consider various collaborative proj- of Research and Sponsored Programs. Levander, professor of English and ects. The next public lecture will be The working group has embarked director of the Humanities Research on February 12, 2009, and will feature on an 18-month series of lectures and Center at Rice University. Her top- Saskia Sassen, Ralph Lewis Professor of workshops that will treat three broad ic, “From Southern to Hemispheric Sociology at the University of Chicago themes: “The Global South: Literary, Southern Studies,” turned to the case and Centennial Visiting Professor at Cultural, and Theoretical Study,” “The study of Sutton Griggs, an African the London School of Economics. Her Global South: Immigration, Religion, American man who lived along the topic will be “Reassembling Territory, and Transnationalism,” and “The U.S./Mexico border at the turn into Authority, and Rights in Today’s Global Global South: Movement, Migration, the 20th century. The second lecture South.” and African Diasporas.” The fi rst of was by Walter Mignolo, William H. these meetings, focused on literary, cul- Wannamaker Professor of Literature Kathryn B. McKee

Page 6 Fall 2008 The Southern Register The Artists among Us Just as the South is known for its his- ings and photographs entitled Curious Camp Best Otherness toric outpouring of art, the Center for with some of , which will be on display at the Study of Southern Culture must his drawings Glo Design Studio in Oxford until the be recognized for its students, faculty, end of the month. and alumni who are also practicing Even those who are no longer directly artists and, in their work, have man- involved with the Center recall their aged to fi nd links between their fi eld of time there as positively affecting their study and their chosen form of personal art-making process. Lynn Marshall- expression. Linnemeier, an alumna of the Southern David Wharton, a professor of Studies Program, currently works as a Documentary Fieldwork at the Center, professor at Agnes Scott College and claims he was born into Southern Studies as a visual artist. “Most of the stuff that without knowing it. “As child, my I do is photo-based mixed media. And school-year residence was in New Jersey, I like to look at historical fi gures,” she just outside of New York City. That’s says. Her introduction to the program where my dad worked, in New York. But came back in 1989, when she was work- he had been raised in North Carolina, ing as a fi eld studies director for the

and had a large extended family there, I’Nasah Crockett Mississippi Self-Portrait project with and my mother, my brother, and I would Bill Ferris, the founding director of the go to North Carolina and stay with them student, came to Southern Studies af- Center. “I just fell in love with the no- in the summertime, so I was constantly ter a signifi cant absence from the world tion of studying the South, because I’m comparing the differences in lifestyle, of academia. Originally hailing from from the South so I just fi nd it an abso- and just the way everything happened in Jackson, he says that returning to school lutely fascinating place, and region of my mind, even as a child.” has been nothing but positive. “It’s been the country. But regarding the Southern Eventually he landed a position on the a wonderful experience for me, getting Studies Program, I guess what fascinated faculty at the Center, which gave him back into academia. Personally, spiritu- me was the research that I did while I the opportunity to further explore one ally, in every way it has reenergized me was there.” Although she is no longer a of his artistic interests: small-town and as a person. Part of it, too, is that get- student (MA, 2006), research still plays rural culture in the South. “I photograph ting away from Jackson has freed me up, a major role in Marshall-Linnemeier’s both people living in those kinds of and getting into academia has freed me artistic process. She’s currently spend- places and doing things,” he says. “And up to open my mind again, and to start ing time traveling between New Orleans I also photograph what I think of as the exploring new ideas.” This new sense and Savannah, Georgia, gathering infor- cultural landscape, which is generally of awareness, he says, echoes in his art- mation for her latest project, a study of without people, per se, but those cultural work, which consists primarily of paint- fortune tellers. “I want to do a series of landscape photographs are very much ings and pen-and-ink drawings. “When quilts on them. I fi nd it fascinating that about the interaction between people I got to Oxford I did not have a studio, these women are passing down some of and the physical place their predecessors still haven’t found a reasonable space, these traditions that they’ve been intro- have made, and they continue to live in, so I returned to drawing, and that’s duced to.” Even when she’s not working and make as they live there.” what I’ve been doing recently. I’ve on an art project, it’s safe to say that her This interest is apparent in his most also gotten interested in photography, experiences at the Center left her with recent exhibition of 22 photographs, and that’s a brand new medium for me, a whetted appetite for gathering infor- The Power of Belief: Photographs from inspired by my documentary photogra- mation. “I still continue to do that, I the Religious South. Half of the 22 are phy class that I took in the Southern like to research things. I love archives; about people actively involved in vari- Studies Program under David Wharton. I’m always in somebody’s archives dig- ous forms of worship; the others, land- Getting behind the camera opened up a ging around for photographs. I like to be scapes, depict the various religious new world for me as a new creative av- able to give people some historical back- themes. Wharton states, “I like to be- enue, a new vision for seeing things in a ground whenever I talk about pieces, so lieve that the best photographs have different way, and then translating what that’s when the research comes in.” meaning that is supported by the formal I see and what I create onto paper.” Best aspects of the photographs. Meaning currently has an exhibition of his draw- I’Nasah Crockett has to do with the way people relate to the world around them, the way people For samples of David Wharton’s photographs, see page 31 of this issue of relate to people around them, and [to] the Register and/or the Center’s Web site. For samples of Lynn Marshall- the physical world around them.” Linnemeier’s work, see http://home.earthlink.net/~lynnlinn/. Camp Best, a second-year graduate

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 7 no. Call for Papers six Faulkner & Yoknapatawpha “Faulkner and Mystery” OXFORDFILMFEST.COM July 19–23, 2009

Throughout his writing career, William Faulkner demonstrated a deep interest OXFORD if not in what is normally regarded as detective fi ction, then in its thematic and formal staple: the process of detection. Characteristically, he compounded the usual attributes of the mode: incessant qualifi cation and complication, confl ict- ing yet always compelling speculation, late revelation, along with a readiness— perhaps the most distinctive Faulknerian touch—to leave matters unresolved. It is as if there were no solution that could possibly match the game of detection itself, as if mystery were not something to be explained but to be preserved as the basis of signifi cant thought. The 36th annual Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference will examine “mystery” in Faulkner’s fi ction as a prominent thematic element and formal strategy. The approach is relevant to his passion for modernist experiment, his concern with the processes of knowing, and his expansion of the popular fi c- tional and cinematic practices of his time. Here are some of the questions and issues that might be considered: How does Faulkner handle mystery in those texts—Sanctuary, Knight’s Gambit, and Intruder in the Dust—in which he seems to be relying on standard strategies? How does the mystery that remains in a THRU specifi c Faulkner text illuminate the action that somehow works to keep that 5 8 mystery hidden? What is the effect of mystery on the thematic statement—so- cial, racial, economical, sexual, historical, colonial—that the text engages? Does Faulkner refuse commitment by refusing resolution—and if not, what 2009 form does commitment take? Is there a melding of period defi nition in mys- tery: modernism, postmodernism, postcolonialism—or the emergence of a new defi nition? What bearing does the idea of mystery have on Faulkner’s work as a screenwriter? We are inviting 40-minute plenary papers and 20-minute panel papers. Plenary papers consist of approximately 5,000 words and will appear in the conference volume published by the University Press of Mississippi. Panel pa- pers consist of approximately 2,500 words and will be considered by the confer- ence program committee for possible expansion and inclusion in the published volume. For plenary papers the 15th edition of The Chicago Manual of Style should be used as a guide in preparing manuscripts. Three copies of manuscripts (hard copy only) must be submitted by January 31, 2009. Authors whose papers are selected will receive (1) a waiver of the conference registration fee and (2) lodging at the Inn at Ole Miss from Saturday, July 18, through Thursday, July 23. For short papers, two-page abstracts must be submitted by January 31, 2009, either through e-mail attachment or hard copy. Authors whose papers are se- lected will receive a reduction of the registration fee to $100. All manuscripts and inquiries should be addressed to Donald Kartiganer, Department of English, The University of Mississippi, University, MS 38677– 1848. Telephone: 662-915-5793; e-mail: [email protected]. Decisions for all papers will be made by March 1, 2009.

This project partially funded by a grant from the Oxford Tourism Council

Page 8 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Richard Wright Centennial Update September 4, 2008, Richard Wright’s Claudius Claiborne 100th birthday, began with early morn- ing radio broadcasts. On National Public Radio, Garrison Keller made remarks about Wright’s importance, on The Writer’s Almanac. Patrick Oliver hosted the birthday tribute on Literary Nation (KABF FM 88.3, Little Rock, Arkansas), which included interviews with Patricia McGraw and Jerry Ward. At Tougaloo College, Howard Rambsy (Southern Illinois University–Edwardsville) spoke on publishing and Wright, a prelude to evening activities. In Little Rock, the Willie Hinton Neighborhood Resource Center unveiled the “Richard Wright Day Proclamation” and presented a pro- gram of Wright’s poetry; discussions of Wright’s teenage years, Wright and the Harlem Renaissance, Wright and today’s music (rap, R&B, hip hop); and read- ings of excerpts from Wright’s works by male youths. In Dallas, Texas, the Paul Quinn College Library presented “One Book, One College.” In Mississippi, citizens of Jackson initiated a week of events (September 4–11) with a birth- day reception for Wright’s daughter Julia at Smith Robertson Museum and Cultural Center, the school from which her father graduated in 1925. Although the 100th anniversary of Wright’s birth was a climactic moment, it marked new beginnings rather than a traditional sense of an ending. The week of events in Jackson included September 5: Tour: Richard Wright’s Jackson September 5–6: Richard Wright Novelist John Edgar Wideman, Professor of Africana Studies at Brown Institute for Teachers sponsored by the University, addressing the International Richard Wright Centennial Conference Margaret Walker Alexander Research at the American University of Paris in June 2008 Center, Jackson State University September 6: Richard Wright Parade in which fi ve Jackson Public Schools Wright and Our 21st Century” Other September events included marching bands participated Mississippi Department of Archives September 15: “Celebrating African September 7: Humanities forum on and History “History Is Lunch Series” American Voices at Pennsylvania “Richard Wright and Activism” featur- featuring Julia Wright and former State University” (“The Legacy of ing Julia Wright, College of Liberal Governor William Winter Richard Wright” lecture by Jerry Arts, Jackson State University September 11: Address and book Ward) September 9: Keynote address by Julia signing by Julia Wright at Tougaloo September 20: Initial meeting of the Wright at Tougaloo College College Lecture by Dr. Marvin Haire Mississippi Humanities Council’s “4 September 10: Wright Day to Read (Mississippi Valley State University) W Teachers Institute,” which will (Tougaloo College) with Jerry Ward’s on “Richard Wright and the Blues” at involve workshops throughout the lecture “One Writer’s Legacy: Richard the State Capitol year on Richard Wright, Eudora Welty,

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 9 Claudius Claiborne Tennessee Williams, and Margaret Walker September 27: “Richard Nathaniel Wright: A Centennial Celebration” at the Historic Natchez Foundation

Wright left Jackson for Memphis in 1925, and the celebratory events fol- lowed the same path with Julia Wright’s keynote address at the University of Memphis, Fogelman Executive Center, on October 2. The University sponsored a symposium on Wright and Reginald Brown, “Performing Richard Wright,” on October 3. The same day Southwest Tennessee Community College students performed dramatic readings of Wright’s texts under the direction of the play- wright Levi Frazier. Conversations with Julia Wright and Honors Academy and Service Learning Students (above) Julia Wright, Richard were held on October 4 at Wright’s elder daughter, Parrish Library; on October with her son, Malcolm, 6, Julia Wright was the at the June 2008 Richard International Education Wright Celebration at Tsuru speaker at the STCC Union University in Yamanashi, Japan Campus Theater. Also (left) Maryemma Graham, scheduled for the month Professor of English at the were Jerry Ward’s “Reading University of Kansas, and Wright” for the Wright Sachi Nakachi, Professor of reading group at Vanderbilt English at Tsuru University, University (October 8); during the Richard Wright “Drumvoices: A Celebration Celebration in Japan of Richard Wright (1908– 1960) and Henry Dumas Joyce’s review essay “Richard Claudius Claiborne (1934–1968)” at Rutgers, Wright’s A Father’s Law.” the State University of New Jersey on C. Catsam (University of Texas of the The Mississippi Quarterly’s special issue on October 16 (This event was organized Permian Basin). Darryl Dickerson-Carr Wright is now in press, as is the Southern by Cheryl A. Wall, Rutgers, and Eugene (Southern Methodist University) will Quarterly’s issue that will contain papers B. Redmond, editor of Drumvoices speak on “Writers’ Block on Richard from the 2008 Natchez Literary and Revue.); “Richard Wright Centennial Wright” at Paperbacks Plus (Dallas). Cinema Celebration, “Richard Wright, Discussion,” Community Book Center, The fi nal major event for the 2008 cen- the South, and the World.” New Orleans, Louisiana, on October 18. tennial year will be “Richard Wright Wright’s infl uence in the worlds of On October 21, at Vanderbilt University, at 100,” an International Conference literature and international thought is the Richard Wright Centennial sponsored by the Department of Letters, such that tributes to him will continue Reading Series, a yearlong discussion University of Beira Interior, Portugal, on in 2009. Wilfred D. Samuels has already of Wright’s work and its historical and November 28 and 29. issued a call for papers for the symposium cultural contexts, featured Uncle Tom’s In addition to many 2008 newspa- “Richard Wright: The Man, the Writer, Children. Native Son (November 19) per and magazine articles on Wright, and His Place in American and African and Black Boy (December 16) will also The Richard Wright Encyclopedia, ed- American Letters” at the University of be examined during the fall semester. ited by Jerry W. Ward Jr. and Robert J. Utah, April 2–5, 2009. Those who have On November 7–8, the Richard Wright Butler, was published by Greenwood profi ted greatly from Richard Wright’s Centennial Symposium was held at Press on June 30. Drumvoices Revue, legacy now await an offi cial announce- the African American Museum in vol. 16: 1 and 2 (Spring–Summer–Fall ment from the United States Postal Dallas, Texas. This meeting includ- 2008) featured “Kwansabas for Richard Service that we will be able to mail our ed talks by James A. Miller (Richard Wright Centennial” by 95 writers; Julia letters with Richard Wright stamps. Wright Circle), Maryemma Graham Wright’s essay “The Homestretch to (University of Kansas), Jerry W. Ward the Centennial” and her four tankas for Jerry W. Ward Jr. Jr. (Dillard University), and Dereck Wright’s 100th Birthday; and Joyce Ann

Page 10 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Natchez Literary and Cinema Celebration to Celebrate Eudora Welty Centennial Chrissy Wilson When it comes to literature, suggested in Miss Welty’s the American South is well writings. known far and wide for its Honoring Eudora Welty writers. What might not be was a natural decision so well known is that a large for the NLCC Steering number of Southern women Committee, Smith said. are part of that elite group. “Miss Welty helped found “The Natchez Literary and the Celebration when she Cinema Celebration will try agreed to be on the agenda to remedy that situation,” for the fi rst conference in said Carolyn Vance Smith, 1990,” Smith said. founder and cochairman of The theme for the fi rst the Olympic Award–win- Eudora Welty (left) and Suzanne Marrs conference was “The ning conference. The 20th Natchez Trace: Its Literary annual conference, set for February 19– Louisiana Poet Laureate, All Saints: Legacy.” Welty read aloud her famed 22, 2009, will use the theme “Southern New and Selected Poems story that is set on the Trace, “A Worn Women Writers: Saluting the Eudora • Dorothea Benton Frank, New York Path.” “She absolutely captivated the Welty Centennial.” Times best-selling author from audience,” Smith said. “She read with “Consider some of the women writers South Carolina, Sullivan’s Island, such fl air. She could have been a suc- from Mississippi and their long-lasting Bulls Island cessful actress if she had wanted a sec- works,” Smith said. They include: • Katherine Anne Porter, 1890–1980, ond career.” Welty continued to sup- Pulitzer Prize–winning author from port the event the rest of her life, Smith • Eudora Welty, 1909–2001, Pulitzer Texas, Flowering Judas and Ship of said. Prize-winning author of Delta Fools In addition to honoring Southern Wedding and The Robber Bridegroom women writers, the conference will hon- • Margaret Walker Alexander, 1915– “All of these women writers will be or former Mississippi governor William 1998, Jubilee and Richard Wright: featured at the 2009 NLCC,” Smith Winter and his wife, Elise, at a free Daemonic Genius said. “Programs will be either by them public reception on February 21, Smith • Elizabeth Spencer, born 1921, PEN/ or about them.” said. “Every year since the beginning, Malamud Award for Short Fiction, On February 19, the conference Governor Winter has been director of The Light in the Piazza and The Night will focus on Welty and her works; on proceedings for the NLCC. We can’t Travelers February 20, on Welty’s contemporaries imagine having the conference without • Ellen Douglas, born 1921, National and their works; and on February 21, on him and Mrs. Winter. We are so grate- Book Award nominee, Apostles of Welty’s successors and their works. On ful to them.” Hosting the reception will Light and Truth: Four Stories I Am February 22, writing workshops named be the NLCC, the Center for the Study Finally Old Enough to Tell in honor of Natchez native Ellen of Southern Culture at the University • Natasha Trethewey, born 1966, Douglas will conclude the conference. of Mississippi, and Copiah-Lincoln Pulitzer Prize–winning author of “Again this year, we have some of the Community College, which has spon- Domestic Work and Native Guard top scholars and writers in the coun- sored the conference since 1990. • Julia Reed, born 1961, The House on try on the agenda,” Smith said. “The The NLCC is free except for certain First Street: My New Orleans Story keynote speaker is Suzanne Marrs of meals and the play To Kill a Mockingbird. and Queen of the Turtle Derby Millsaps College, who is the author- Information and tickets are available • Carolyn Haines, born 1953, Summer ity on Eudora Welty. Among other at www.colin.edu/nlcc, by calling 601- of the Redeemer and Them Bones books, she has written Eudora Welty: A 446-1208 or 866-296-6522, or by e- Biography and One Writer’s Imagination: mailing [email protected]. “Also consider women writers from The Fiction of Eudora Welty.” Sponsors of the conference in addi- other Southern states,” Smith said. Enhancing the programs will be doc- tion to Copiah-Lincoln are Natchez They include: umentary fi lms, a dramatic version of To National Historical Park, Mississippi Kill a Mockingbird at the Natchez Little Department of Archives and History, • Harper Lee, born 1926, Pulitzer Theatre, panel discussions, book sign- and Mississippi Public Broadcasting. Prize–winning author from Alabama, ings, exhibitions, concerts, a writing Partial funding comes from the To Kill a Mockingbird awards ceremony, and receptions. In Mississippi Humanities Council and • Brenda Marie Osbey, born 1957, addition are two meals featuring menus the Mississippi Arts Commission.

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 11 2009 Mississippi Delta Literary Tour The Mississippi Delta Literary Tour, set for March 22–26, 2009, will again travel across the Delta countryside exploring the region’s rich literary, culinary, and musical heritage. The tour will be based at the Alluvian Hotel in downtown Greenwood and will travel to Indianola, Clarksdale, and Greenville, making stops along the way in the communities of Money, Tutwiler, and Merigold. The group will gather at the Alluvian on Sunday afternoon, March 22, for talks about the history of Greenwood, which became known as the “world’s largest inland long-staple cotton market” and the home of Endesha Ida Mae Holland, Frank Smith, Mildred Spurrier Topp, and other writers. We’ll learn about area art and artists, visit Turnrow Book Company, and enjoy dinner prepared by The B. B. King Museum and Delta Cultural Center opened in Indianola, Mississippi, on one of the Mississippi’s famous cooks. September 13, 2008. For details, see www.bbkingmuseum/org. In Indianola, on Monday, the group will visit the new B. B. King Museum; experience down-home Delta music in earned him the moniker “Spokesman Club Ebony, the famed blues club; and for the New South.” Joining the dis- see an exhibition celebrating the life and cussion on Hodding Carter Jr. will be work of New York Times food editor Craig University of Mississippi journalism Claiborne, who grew up in the town’s leg- professor Curtis Wilkie and author and endary boardinghouse run by his mother. journalist Julia Reed, both of whom are Indianola native, author, and former natives of Greenville. The tour will English professor Marion Barnwell will once again visit McCormick Book Inn, give a presentation about Claiborne and the Delta’s—and Mississippi’s—oldest his books. Steve Yarbrough, another independent bookstore, where visiting Indianola native, will also be along to and local authors will gather to sign talk about growing up in the Delta and their work. writing about the place in several of his The Delta tour is $575 per person for award-winning works of fi ction, includ- all program activities, 10 meals, and lo- ing Visible Spirits, Prisoners of War, and cal transportation. The fee does not The End of California. include lodging. Remember to sign up En route to Clarksdale, on Tuesday, early. Only a limited number of places Delta State University professor Henry center for blues recordings and folk art; are available, and they will go fast. Outlaw and director of the Delta and the Delta Blues Museum. After Group accommodations are of- Center for Culture and Learning Luther dinner, the tour will return by way fered at the Alluvian, in downtown Brown will talk about the region, and of Merigold, with visits to McCartys Greenwood (www.thealluvian.com). the group will stop at Robert Johnson’s Pottery and Po’ Monkey’s juke joint. Rooms at the Alluvian require a sepa- gravesite, see the remains of the store In Greenville, on Wednesday, rate registration. Standard rooms are in Money where Emmett Till alleg- Hodding Carter III, author and former priced at a discounted rate of $170. Call edly made his tragic whistle, and visit publisher of the newspaper his father 866-600-5201 and ask for the Literary with local quilters and gospel singers began in 1938, the Delta Democrat- Tour rate. Also call the hotel to in- at the Tutwiler Community Education Times, will discuss his father’s lasting in- quire about rates for luxury rooms and Center. Clarksdale sites will include fl uence and legacy. Using his newspaper suites. Additional rooms have been set the Cutrer Mansion and St. George’s as his platform, Hodding Carter Jr. pub- aside at the Greenwood Best Western, Episcopal Church, where literary schol- licly tackled the hot-button Southern 662-455-5777, or the Hampton Inn, ar W. Kenneth Holditch will speak issue of racial equality, and in 1946 he 662-455-7985. on the town’s infl uence on Tennessee won the Pulitzer Prize for his outspoken Williams’s work; Cathead Records, a editorial work, writings that eventually

Page 12 Fall 2008 The Southern Register The 16th Oxford Conference for the Book The University of Mississippi • Oxford, Mississippi March 26–28, 2009

The 16th Oxford Conference for the exhibition titled Walter Anderson and Two Literature for Young Authors ses- Book, set for March 26–28, 2009, will World Literature, curated by the artist’s sions are scheduled for Friday morning. celebrate the life and legacy of Mississippi son, John Anderson of Ocean Springs, All Oxford-area fi fth- and ninth-grade Gulf Coast artist, author, and naturalist Mississippi. Anderson and his sisters, students (nearly 1,000 readers) will re- Walter Inglis Anderson (1903–1965) on Leif Anderson and Mary Anderson ceive their own copies of books from the the opening day. Fifth and ninth graders Pickard, will talk about their father’s selected authors, courtesy of the Junior will join the audience on Friday morn- life and artistic and literary legacy dur- Auxiliary of Oxford, the Lafayette ing for sessions with authors of books ing a panel moderated by editor JoAnne County Literary Council, and Square for young readers, and the conference Pritchard Morris. Other sessions will Books Jr., and also have a chance to will continue through Saturday after- include remarks by artist William hear the authors speak about writing and noon with a variety of addresses, read- Dunlap, publisher Seetha Srinivasan, reading. Fifth graders will receive copies ings, and panels. The conference edition Patti Carr Black (American Masters of of The Mysterious Benedict Society, win- of Thacker Mountain Radio, a special the Gulf Coast; Art in Mississippi, 1720– ner of the 2008 E. B. White Read Aloud Elderhostel program, a fi ction and po- 1980), Christopher Maurer (Fortune’s Award, and meet the author, Trenton etry jam, a marathon book signing at Favorite Child: The Uneasy Life of Walter Lee Stewart, from Little Rock. The au- Off Square Books, a writing workshop Anderson; Dreaming in Clay on the Coast thor and book for ninth graders will be (March 25), and an optional literary of Mississippi), and Patricia Pinson announced later this fall. tour of the Mississippi Delta (March (The Art of Walter Anderson; Form On Friday afternoon literary scholar 22–26) are also part of the festivities. and Fantasy: The Block Prints of Walter Peggy Whitman Prenshaw will present The program will begin at the J. D. Anderson). Following these sessions will an address commemorating the 100th Williams Library on Thursday with be a live broadcast of Thacker Mountain anniversary of Eudora Welty’s birth and lunch and a presentation on a new Radio and a dinner honoring speakers. prepare readers for her Collected Stories, the 2009 Mississippi Reads book. To CREATIVE WRITING WORKSHOP, MARCH 25, 2009 celebrate American Poetry Month, po- ets Jimmy Kimbrell, this year’s Grisham Margaret-Love Denman, former director of the creative writing program at the Writer in Residence, and Camille University of New Hampshire and currently coordinator of off-campus writing Dungy will read from their work and programs at the University of Mississippi, will offer a special workshop in con- talk about the state of poetry today. junction with the 2009 Oxford Conference for the Book. The daylong work- Jack Pendarvis, last year’s Grisham shop, titled “Mining Your Raw Materials,” will take place Wednesday, March Writer and author of two story collec- 25, at the Downtown Grill on tions and the recently published novel the Oxford Square. Awesome, will chair a panel on graphic The workshop is open to 20 narratives. Journalist Curtis Wilkie will writers. The workshop fee of $250 lead a discussion of books about poli- includes evaluation of up to 20 tics, with authors Hodding Carter III double-spaced pages submitted (The Reagan Years, The South Strikes beforehand, a private 20-min- Back), Julia Reed (Queen of the Turtle ute session with the instructor Derby and Other Southern Phenomena, during the March 26–28 confer- The House on First Street), and David ence, attendance at all confer- Maraniss (First in His Class: A Biography ence events, lunch and refresh- of Bill Clinton; The Prince of Tennessee: ments on Wednesday, dinner on Al Gore Meets His Fate; “Tell Newt to Thursday, and a box lunch on Shut Up!”). Following a break for din- Friday. Also, each registrant will ner will be a session open to all par- receive a copy of Story Matters: ticipants who wish to read selections of Contemporary Short Story Writers their own poetry or fi ction. Share the Creative Process. The On Saturday, educator Elaine H. fee does not include lodging. Scott will moderate a panel titled First come, fi rst served. “The Endangered Species: Readers See page 14 for additional de- Today and Tomorrow,” and Center in- tails and page 16 for a registra- Perry Smith terim director Ted Ownby will discuss tion form. Margaret-Love Denman “Writing after Katrina” with authors

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 13 who changed the subjects of their work gram will soon be posted on the Center’s ELDERHOSTEL PROGRAM, after dealing with the effects of the hur- Web site. MARCH 25–29, 2009 ricane. J. Peder Zane, of the News and The conference is open to the public Observer in Raleigh, North Carolina, without charge. To assure seating space, An Elderhostel program will take place will consider the topic “Writing Book those interested in attending should during the 2009 Oxford Conference Reviews” with memoirist and novel- preregister. Reservations and advance for the Book. Cost is $597 per person, ist Haven Kimmel, fi ction writer Lydia payment are required for two optional double occupancy, for conference pro- Millet, and John Freeman, a prolifi c events: a cocktail buffet on Thursday gramming, a special Elderhostel-only critic whose fi rst book, Don’t Send: The ($50) and a box lunch on Friday ($10). session with a Faulkner expert, tour Unbearable Tyranny of Email, will soon Call 662-915-5993 or visit www.oxford- of Faulkner’s home, Rowan Oak, four be published by Scribner. conferenceforthebook.com for more in- nights’ lodging, all meals from dinner The slate of speakers is not yet fi nal, formation or to register for conference March 25 through breakfast March 29, but Jesse J. Scott, assistant professor of programs. and local transportation. Elderhostel English and African American Studies The University of Mississippi and participants must be 55 years old or at the University of Mississippi, has in- Square Books sponsor the conference older or traveling with someone at vited three authors to read from their in association with the Junior Auxiliary least 55. To register, call toll-free, 877- work, and the Square Books staff is or- of Oxford, Lafayette County-Oxford 426-8056 and ask for program 12317- ganizing a literary magazines session, Public Library, Lafayette County 032509. For information, call program to be moderated by Richard Howorth. Literacy Council, Oxford Middle School coordinator Carolyn Vance Smith in Additional authors and others involved PTA, Mississippi Library Commission, Natchez, 601-446-1208, or e-mail her with the world of books will also speak and Mississippi Hills Heritage Area at [email protected]. at the conference. The complete pro- Alliance.

Registration Information Oxford Conference for the Book and Delta Literary Tour

OXFORD CONFERENCE FOR THE WORKSHOP FOR WRITERS DELTA LITERARY TOUR BOOK The daylong workshop “Mining This special event takes place March The conference is open to the public Your Raw Materials” will take place 22–26 and is $575 per person for all without charge. To assure seating space, Wednesday, March 25, at the Downtown program activities, 10 meals, and local those interested in attending should Grill on the Oxford Square. The work- transportation. The fee does not in- preregister. Reservations and advance shop fee of $250 includes evaluation of clude lodging. payment are required for an optional up to 20 double-spaced pages submit- cocktail buffet on Thursday ($50). ted beforehand, a private 20-minute GREENWOOD HOTEL All proceeds of the cocktail buffet on session with the instructor during the REGISTRATION Thursday will go toward supporting March 26–28 Oxford Conference for Rooms at the Alluvian require a the conference and are tax deductible. the Book, attendance at all confer- separate registration, are priced at a Participants are invited to make addi- ence events, lunch and refreshments discounted rate of $170, and may be tional tax-deductible contributions to on Wednesday, lunch and dinner on reserved by dialing 866-600-5201 and help support the conference. All pro- Thursday, and lunch on Friday. Also, asking for the special Delta Literary ceeds for the box lunch will go toward each registrant will receive a copy of Tour rate. Also call the hotel to in- support of the Lafayette County Literacy Story Matters: Contemporary Short Story quire about rates for luxury rooms Council and are tax deductible. Writers Share the Creative Process, by and suites. Additional rooms have workshop instructor Margaret-Love been set aside at the Greenwood LUNCH ON THURSDAY, Denman and novelist Barbara Shoup, Best Western, 662-455-5777, or MARCH 26 writer in residence at the Writers’ the Hampton Inn, 662-455-7985. The Williams Library will host a light Center of Indiana. lunch at noon for the Walter Inglis Note: Contributions and payments Anderson exhibition and talk. To ac- must be made by credit card. cept the invitation, please check Friday lunch on the conference registration form. Details about the conference, tour, and workshop are posted on www.oxfordconferenceforthebook.com/.

Page 14 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Walter Anderson and World Literature “Along with thousands of paintings, sculptures, block prints, and writings, Walter Anderson (1903–1965) created over 9,500 pen-and-ink illustrations of scenes from Don Quixote, Paradise Lost, Pope’s Iliad, and Bulfi nch’s Legends of Charlemagne. He also drew inspiration from such sources as Paradise Regained, Temora from The Poems of Ossian, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Alice in Wonderland, and Darwin’s The Voyage of the Beagle.” —from Illustrations of Epic and Voyage, edited by Redding S. Sugg Jr. (University Press of Mississippi, 2006)

Walter Anderson “is Mississippi’s greatest artist . . . [and] was also a poet and a writer who attempted to interpret the natural world of the Gulf Coast. . . . At his death 82 volumes of his journals were discovered. The Horn Island Logs of Walter Inglis An- derson (1973) contains portions of these journals, mostly written on Horn Island. A revised edition was published in 1985; both were edited by Redding Sugg Jr. —from Touring Literary Mississippi by Patti Carr Black and Marion Barnwell (University Press of Mississippi, 2002) Images Courtesy the Family of Walter Anderson Images Courtesy the Family of Walter Ancient Mariner: Raising the Sail Images Courtesy the Family of Walter Anderson Images Courtesy the Family of Walter

Images Courtesy the Family of Walter Anderson Images Courtesy the Family of Walter Charlemagne: Adorned Bayard Iliad: In Hot Pursuit

For more information concerning the conference, contact: For tourist information, contact: Center for the Study of Southern Oxford Convention and Visitors For information about books and Culture Bureau authors, contact: The University of Mississippi 102 Ed Perry Boulevard Square Books P.O. Box 1848 Oxford, MS 38655 160 Courthouse Square University, MS 38677-1848 telephone 800-758-9177 Oxford, MS 38655 telephone 662-915-5993 662-232-2367 telephone 800-468-4001 fax 662-915-5814 fax 662-232-8680 662-236-2262 • fax 662-234-9630 e-mail [email protected] www.oxfordcvb.com www.squarebooks.com/ www.oxfordconferenceforthebook.com/

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 15 OXFORD CONFERENCE FOR THE BOOK 2009 REGISTRATION FORM Photocopy a separate copy of this form for each registrant. Please type or print the information requested. Please return by March 20, 2009 PLEASE MAIL REGISTRATI0N FORMS TO THIS ADDRESS: OXFORD CONFERENCE FOR THE BOOK CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF SOUTHERN CULTURE THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSISSIPPI • P.O. BOX 1848 • UNIVERSITY, MS 38677-1848 FAX TO 662-915-5814 • E-MAIL TO [email protected]

NAME ______

ADDRESS ______

CITY ______STATE ______ZIP ______

OCCUPATION/POSITION ______

INSTITUTION/ORGANIZATION ______

PRIMARY TELEPHONE ______MOBILE TELEPHONE ______

FAX ______E-MAIL ______

I request reservations for the following: ❏ Entire Program (all readings, panels, talks) ❏ If not attending entire conference, indicate day(s) below. ❏ Thursday, March 26 ❏ Friday, March 27 ❏ Saturday, March 28 ❏ Library Luncheon on Thursday, March 26 (no charge) ❏ Cocktail Buffet on Thursday, March 26 ($50 contribution) ❏ Creative Writing Workshop, Wednesday, March 25 ($250) ❏ Delta Literary Tour, March 22–March 25 ($575)

I am making a contribution in the amount of $ for the March 26 cocktail buffet and/or for conference support. I am making a payment of $ for the Creative Writing Workshop and/or the Delta Literary Tour.

Note: Separate checks must be made for payments and contributions. Contributions and payments made by credit card may be charged together.

❏ Check, made payable to THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSISSIPPI, is enclosed. ❏ Charge to ❏ Visa ❏ MasterCard

Account Number ______Expiration Date ______

Signature ______Date ______

I understand that refunds for contributions are not allowed and that payments for meals, the Writing Workshop, and the Delta tour, less a $10 service charge, are refundable if I submit a written request for cancellation, postmarked no later than March 16. No refunds will be made after March 16.

Signature ______Date ______

I learned about the conference from (mark all applicable sources): ❏ Conference fl yer ❏ Southern Register ❏ Other:______

Posters and t-shirts for the 2009 Conference, illustrated with a drawing by Walter Inglis Anderson, will be available in March 2009 for $10 and $15 plus shipping and handling. Please call 662-915-5993 or e-mail [email protected] to order.

Page 16 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Trenton Lee Stewart Selected as Fifth-Grade Author

Each year the Oxford Conference for Clever, riddle-loving Reynie the Book showcases two writers who Muldoon, skinny (as a stick) specialize in books for young readers. Sticky Washington, the always All participating Oxford-area fi fth- and prepared Kate Wetherall, and ninth-grade students receive personal the diminutive but tough-talking copies of novels from the selected au- Constance Contraire are the four thors (courtesy of the Junior Auxiliary children hand-selected by the of Oxford, the Lafayette County mysterious Mr. Benedict of the Literary Council, and Square Books novel’s title, to save the world. Jr.) and also have a chance to hear the Benedict knows that the evil in- authors speak about their work dur- ventor Mr. Curtain is working ing the conference. Last year’s authors on a system using television that were Christopher Paul Curtis (Bud, can broadcast silent messages to Not Buddy) and Margaret McMullan all of mankind, essentially brain- (In My Mother’s House). Other notable washing them to do his bidding. authors from past Young Authors Fairs Many important government include Laurie Halse Anderson, Karen agents have gone missing, yet no Hesse, John Green, Mildred D. Taylor, adult believes Benedict when he T. A. Barron, and Sharon Draper. The tries to warn them of Curtain’s 2009 author selection for fi fth graders is dangerous ways. Benedict knows Trenton Lee Stewart. The ninth-grade that only by sending innocent author has yet to be decided. clear-minded children undercover Winner of the 2008 E. B. White Read Aloud Award Trenton Lee Stewart’s fi rst book for into Curtain’s Learning Institute for the children (and the 2009 Young Author’s Very Enlightened is there a chance that pick), The Mysterious Benedict Society, Stonetown and the rest of the world can comes in at a whopping 484 pages, but be saved. With only their wits in tow, just as I wish I could read as quickly and that’s nothing for today’s long-book- Reynie, Sticky, Kate, and Constance remember as well as Sticky does, and be loving middle readers. Nearly every enroll in Curtain’s school and, during as acrobatic as Kate, and have a frac- fi fth grader in the world, it seems, has secret meetings each night, they begin tion of Constance’s ability to say what read at least one 600-plus-page Harry to unravel Curtain’s plot. she thinks.” Potter volume, so any book coming in As a young reader himself, Trenton Mr. Stewart lives in Little Rock, under 500 pages might seem to them Lee Stewart favored classic adventure Arkansas, with his wife and two sons. like a walk on the playground. The real tales like The Hobbit, Watership Down, He graduated from the Iowa Writer’s challenge for the writer of such a work, and the Rats of NIMH. “I read just about Workshop, teaches creative writ- then, is keeping the kids’ eyes glued everything I could get my hands on, ing, and loves chocolate-chip cookie to all that black and white. And that which meant I read a lot of bad books dough. In addition to The Mysterious is precisely what Mr. Stewart has man- along with the good ones. But my favor- Benedict Society, which has a new se- aged to pull off. ites were always adventures about kids quel out in hardback (The Mysterious The recipe for such a book might look in strange and diffi cult circumstances. Benedict Society and the Perilous like this: take three genius orphans and . . . I learned to read with Spider-Man Journey), Stewart has written one one bespectacled (also genius) runaway, comic books, and Spidey has always re- book for grown-ups, Flood Summer. a crazy riddle-fi lled test, a white-haired mained my favorite. My reasons are the All Oxford-area fi fth graders will have tweedy narcoleptic, a maniac inventor same as everyone’s: He’s a regular guy the opportunity to meet with Stewart with a penchant for green plaid, a brain- with a lot of problems, and he has to during the Literature for Young Readers sweeping, brain-reading machine, and a work hard for everything.” session on campus. All students, teach- cafeteria full of the best junk food a kid In real life, Stewart is himself a rid- ers, parents, and other fans of the au- ever tasted, then load it all up into a dle lover and identifi es the most with thors’ work are invited to attend a book creepy old fortress of a boarding school Reynie Muldoon, from whose point of signing at Square Books Jr. on Thursday, nestled on a craggy island in the middle view The Mysterious Benedict Society March 26, at 3:30 p.m. of shark-infested Stonetown Harbor is mostly told. “I wish I had Reynie’s and stir. shrewdness and his gift of perception, Sally Cassady Lyon

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 17 Won’t You Please Give to Friends of the Center?

Your gift supports a variety of areas and initiatives, including  Publications such as the Southern Register, The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, Living Blues magazine, and the forthcoming Mississippi Encyclopedia  Programs such as the Oxford Conference for the Book, the Faulkner & Yoknapatawpha Conference, and the Future of the South Conference  Assistantships for deserving graduate students  Original research exploring the culture and customs of the South by faculty and students Your gift entitles you to  Discounts on Center merchandise  Discounts for select conferences and symposia  Early registration for select conferences and symposia Thank You for Supporting the Center for the Study of Southern Culture.

Thank you on behalf of Southern Studies students and faculty, and all those who benefi t from the many publications, events, documentary projects, and research projects of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture. Please fi ll out the form below and return your gift in the enclosed envelope, or give online. Give online: www.umfoundation.com/south Learn more: www.olemiss.edu/depts/south • 662-915-5993 • [email protected]

I would like to give to Friends of the Center at the following level: ❍ Patron: $1,000 ❍ Sustaining: $500 ❍ Sponsor: $250 ❍ Regular: $50 ❍ Associate: $100 ❍ Student: $25 ❍ Other donation: $______

Name ______

Address ______

City ______State ______Zip ______

Daytime Phone ______Home Phone ______

E-mail ______

❍ My check is enclosed payable to Friends of the Center. ❍ Please charge my card for the amount indicated. ❍ Visa ❍ Mastercard ❍ American Express

Credit Card # ______Exp. Date ______

Signature ______01529

Page 18 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Reading the South Pelican Road. he suffers from dementia and often By Howard Bahr. San confuses this 1940 trip with a similar Francisco: MacAdam/Cage, one from 1923. Dunn lapses in and 2008. 325 pages. $24.00 cloth. out of the present, and his confused crew are too polite to openly ques- With Pelican Road, Howard Bahr tion his ability. Dunn’s mental state is makes a fascinating departure from his one of the factors contributing to this well-received Civil War novels, The North and South collision (perhaps Black Flower, The Year of Jubilo, and it isn’t entirely a non-Civil War nov- The Judas Field. Surely few novelists el). Another is Donny Luttrell, who have explored the mid-20th-century serves out his penance at Talowah, American railroad with the precision an obscure train station without wait- and care Bahr brings to Pelican Road. ing room, baggage room, or running Acquainted readers will appreciate water, where no passenger trains ever his signature stylistic presence with stop. The Talowah job—“so lone- the bonus of this inspired subject. some and remote that nobody ever Writing about a railroad with its bid on it” —was perfect for Luttrell’s crew of war-damaged men comes father’s purpose. He arranged Danny’s out of the author’s personal history, job to banish him from the Southern as do the novel’s various locales. college he attended, most likely the During the Vietnam War, Bahr was a University of Mississippi, after he gunner’s mate in the U.S. Navy and picts a host of characters—mostly got a young girl pregnant and failed later worked as a brakeman and yard men who work two ill-timed trains— most of his freshman courses. Danny’s clerk on fi ve railroads in the South and shifts in and out of numerous memories of his brief courtship with and Midwest. Pelican Road itself is points of view. The novel’s action Rosamond Lake, “a Chi Omega from a lonely stretch between Meridian, involves the northbound Silver Star a good Greenville family,” helps him Mississippi (Bahr’s birthplace), and and the southbound 4512, a mostly pass his lonely Talowah days and New Orleans. Ole Miss, where Bahr empty freight train (save stowaway nights. The Confederate cemetery served a number of years as curator of Sweet Willie Wine and some hogs), near the university, private and re- Faulkner’s home, Rowan Oak, and re- and their doomed 1940 Christmas mote, served as an unlikely location ceived his master’s degree, and Tulane Eve trip. While the train travels for college romance, and was the site University dominate some important Pelican Road, a lonely stretch be- of their ill-fated rendezvous. Danny, character narratives. tween Meridian, Mississippi, and New who is alternately burdened and com- Bahr’s years as a college professor Orleans, it is the mental and spiritual forted by recollections of his mother, are on display at the novel’s outset, journey of the men that dominates. who died when he was young, felt which opens with a witty little English Many are haunted World War I vets moved by the dead soldiers around composition by the niece of railroad whose work on the railroad has ru- him. Other students “found little pur- brakeman Artemus Kane. Kane, who ined marriages and dominated their pose there and no meaning at all . . . works on the Silver Star, a luxury pas- existence. Railroad work is edgy and they could discern no connection be- senger train, is described by Fanny as dangerous. While they would all like tween their own lives and the rumor a former Marine “Corpral” and writer to daydream, each is conscious of the of nameless men long dead.” who has “written many stories and es- risk. A moment or two misspent can Man and machine are best described says but has been rejected each time” mean serious injury or even death. in this passage depicting Danny’s and whose sweetheart, Anna Rose Time, inconsequential to many, is to fi rst humiliating effort at passing an Dangerfi eld of New Orleans, “has the railroad man “the stuff of life and order: “And all at once, the engine actually written a book that is pub- death. Men died for a moment lost, or loomed over him, its bell tolling, toll- lished, which aggervates my uncle.” because they were tired and misread a ing doom. The earth shook, and the Not to disappoint, she ends her essay train order in the dark.” very air seemed pushed out of shape with “In conclusion.” The 4512’s conductor, A. P. Dunn, as if by a towering storm. The engine Knowing a little bit about Kane who is nicely realized, knows time and erased the sky, extinguished the sun, helps going forward as the novel de- precision are of the essence. However, fi lled all the universe with darkness

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 19 Reading the South continued

and spitting steam, moving fast, the practical manner, to quote Brown drive rods like great mechanical arms (via Robert G. Barrier’s included es- reaching for him, the white-rimmed say “Home and the Open Road: The wheels higher than his head, the long Nonfi ction of Larry Brown”), writing boiler higher than God almighty was about “drawing upon the well of himself.” memory and experience and imagina- The fate of these characters and tion. . . . A writer rolls all that stuff many more unravel as the trains come together kind of like a taco and comes closer to their destinies. All along, up with fi ction.” Memory and experi- the day’s journey has been haunted ence as rolled tacos? This is exactly by the death of June Watson, brother the earthy “stuff” that begs a presence to stowaway Sweet Willie Wine. The when discussing Larry Brown’s work, night before the 4512’s Christmas even when critically analyzing his Eve departure, Watson is tragi- employment of region, gender, race, cally caught in the train’s couplings. and perhaps most prominently, class. Watson knows once he is released he The collection’s10 essays effective- is dead, and it his ability to communi- ly examine Larry Brown’s published cate with the Roy Jack, a detective for work, from the socioenvironmental the Southern Railway—this “rescuer” concerns of the novel Joe to the im- who can only hasten his death—that plications of the narrative structure so unnerves. Watson asks Roy Jack in The Rabbit Factory, without casting to do the uncoupling. It must be, he as Matthew Guinn, Suzanne Jones, aside the lure of the text itself. Editors says, somebody I know. and Owen Gilman (among others) Jean W. Cash, professor of English at News of the tragedy spreads quick- and may well forecast an oncom- James Madison University and author ly and reaches the crew before they ing burst of attention from the fi eld. of a forthcoming biography on Brown, leave. Their sympathy for Watson This is both inviting and appropri- and Keith Perry, associate professor of extends also to Roy Jack and the ate, given the body of available short English at Dalton State University, horrible task he is asked to perform. stories, novels, essays, and corre- have compiled work that forefronts Throughout Pelican Road, Bahr is in- spondence, and of course the Rough scholarship and the unpacking of the tent on examining all varieties of hu- South/New South/No South region subject matter, without severing all man interaction. Roy Jack’s gruff ten- to which Brown’s writing is so in- ties to its creative benefactor. derness and respect for June Watson’s tricately bound. Of course, Brown’s Beginning with the forward by Rick life is a powerful reminder, and there biography also remains compelling Bass, both a critical introduction and are many in this book, of our human as literary focus—the high-school testament to the gentle, generous connections, especially those we senior who failed English but taught nature of his friend, Larry Brown and would rather not claim. himself to write; the fi refi ghter-writ- the Blue Collar-South aims to hold a er; the Oxonian whose sharp sense of discussion with, versus dissection of, Lisa C. Hickman place begged a lineage to Faulkner; the texts and as such doesn’t edge too the “King of Grit Lit”; the gone-too- far into academic colonization of the damn-fast father, friend, contempo- relatively unexamined material. Bass Larry Brown and the Blue- rary, and guidepost. sets the tone for this balance, when Collar South. Yet alongside the praise and signifi - in the opening paragraphs of the fore- cance that scholarship imposes upon word, “A Tribute to Larry Brown,” Edited by Jean W. Cash and authors like Larry Brown, and per- he writes: “The essays that follow Keith Perry. Foreword by Rick haps in particular when examining a this foreword are scholarly treatises, Bass. Jackson: University Press someone whose sentences so uniquely not personal ones, but because Larry of Mississippi, 2008. 184 pages. tangle literary prose, social discourse, was my friend, it’s important to me $50.00 cloth. regionalism, and even pop-culture to tell future readers what I know, reference—not to mention what what I worry they may not otherwise Larry Brown and the Blue-Collar South, Cash labels a merged “autobiographi- discern: that his novels are novels the fi rst publication of literary criti- cal and artistic focus”—criticism can of manners, of deeply moral values, cism devoted entirely to the late au- threaten to diminish the force and works in which every action has pro- thor’s writing, builds upon previous, idiosyncrasy, let alone the pleasure, found consequence and in which ev- individual essays by scholars such of the writing itself. Put in a more ery description is either laced—if not

Page 20 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Reading the South continued UNIVERSITY PRESS of MISSISSIPPI

fraught—with beauty or laments the absence thereof.” Spice Up Your Reading! Following the foreword, alongside Cash’s introduc- tion, the studies then move through Brown’s fi ction and Delta Deep Down non, from Darlin’ Neal’s analysis of how “vulnerability” PHOTOGRAPHS BY JANE RULE BURDINE and “unmasked” suffering counter the Southern mascu- EDITED BY WENDY MCDARIS INTRODUCTION BY STEVE YARBROUGH line façade within Brown’s debut, Facing the Music, to Powerful images capturing the John A. Staunton’s view that Brown’s posthumous A land, people, and ever-present Miracle of Catfi sh “refuses to let regional, working-class spirits of the Mississippi Delta characters be subsumed into the sprawl of national and $40 hardback homogenizing discourses.” The book concludes with an examination by coeditor Perry on the “building” of Larry Brown as marketable writer and with an afterword by fi lmmaker Gary Hawkins about the making of his Blues Traveling The Holy Sites of Delta Blues, fi lm The Rough South of Larry Brown. Third Edition By book-ending the scholarship with biographical BY STEVE CHESEBOROUGH pieces, Larry Brown showcases both the closeness of the Expanded and updated, an indispensable writer to his environment and characters, as well as their new edition of the acclaimed travel guide contradictions. As provided, we can more fully consider to the cradle of the blues the bound but inverted connection between Brown’s $22 paperback liberating drives through the Mississippi back roads and the namesake in his novel Fay, who as Robert Beuka points out “takes to the open road to escape the horrors of her family life,” but fi nds “only more of the same.” TVA Photography, Understanding that, like the title character Joe, Larry 1963–2008 Brown once took work poisoning trees, something he Challenges and Changes in the “regretted” but had to do to “feed his family,” serves as Tennessee Valley complement to Jay Watson’s “Economics of the Cracker BY PATRICIA BERNARD EZZELL Documentary photographs depicting the Landscape: Poverty as an Environmental Issue in Larry recent evolution of a powerful government Brown’s Joe.” And editor Keith Perry’s essay, “Fireman- agency which has greatly impacted the Writer, Bad Boy Novelist, King of Grit Lit: Building Tennessee Valley region Larry Brown(s) at Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill,” $55 unjacketed hardback; $25 paperback illustrates both the empowering and overpowering rela- tionship that a simplifi ed narrative or catchphrase can Photographs from the have on an author’s career. Memphis World, 1949–1964 As proposed in Robert Donahoo’s “Implicating the BY THE MEMPHIS BROOKS Reader: Dirty Work and the Burdens of Southern History,” MUSEUM OF ART Larry Brown’s work actively engages the reader, forcing us INTRODUCTION BY MARINA PACINI to confront the fl esh-and-bone gravity of not only story or An invaluable pictorial overview of character, but also the author’s environment and experi- African American vitality in a southern ence as a whole. Integrating critical focus and biographi- metropolis cal sketch, Larry Brown and the Blue-Collar South promotes $24.95 paperback both the insight of scholarship, as well as the intimacy of its subject matter. A fi ne taco, it would seem. You Are Where You Eat Stories and Recipes from the Odie Lindsey Neighborhoods of New Orleans BY ELSA HAHNE A tour of the delectable and original from thirty-three renowned home cooks Ordering the Façade: Photography and in the Crescent City Contemporary Southern Women’s Writing. $35 hardback By Katherine Henninger. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2007. 232 pages. 36 illustrations. $59.96 cloth, $19.95 www.upress.state.ms.us paper. 800-737-7788

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 21 Reading the South continued

Katherine Henninger’s Ordering the litical nature of representation. Such Façade expertly blends an extensive images serve at least two functions: knowledge of the history and func- they stand in for narrative, and they tion of photography in America extend narrative beyond the repre- with thoughtful readings of fi ctional sentational limits of the text itself. In photographs in recent women’s writ- these fi ctional photographs, she con- ing. The result is an invaluable con- tends, “southern women picture the tribution to the University of North picturing, critiquing and revising the Carolina Press’s New Directions in cultural visions that would still and Southern Studies series. Henninger’s silence them.” work exemplifi es the sort of cross- The three chapters at the cen- disciplinary thinking currently ener- ter of Ordering the Façade each take gizing studies of region and place, at up the work of a different subset the same time that it meaningfully of Southern women writers: white disrupts conventional thinking about women of some privilege (Rosemary frames, framers, and the power of the Daniell, Jill McCorkle, and Josephine photographic eye. Humphreys); African American wom- From the beginning, Henninger en (Zora Neale Hurston, Julie Dash, makes clear the reasons for her region- and Alice Walker); and white women alized, gendered focus. The American from Appalachia, with a primary fo- South, she maintains, has been so fre- cus on the work of Dorothy Allison. quently visualized within our nation- Using Daniell’s memoir Fatal Flowers al consciousness that to many minds markably lucid and concise treat- (1980), McCorkle’s novels The Cheer it exists primarily as an image that ment of her subject, keyed to 36 Leader (1984) and Tending to Virginia has naturalized a certain set of com- included images. The essay could (1987), and Humphreys’s Dreams of peting “truths”: the South as poor, almost function independently of the Sleep (1984), Henninger investigates the South as gracious heir to a col- volume, making on its own an excel- the crippling effects for white women umned plantation past, the South as lent contribution to, for example, of internalizing the white male gaze backward, the South as a haven from any cultural or documentary studies that renders their bodies objects of modernity, the South as convulsed course. Henninger’s main point, that fetish. All three women use pho- around issues of race, the South as “photography may encapsulate the tographs (real in Daniell’s case and feminized. In fact, Henninger sug- complexities of southern representa- fi ctional in the other two) to denatu- gests, the photographed and fi ction- tional politics better than any other ralize the Southern patriarchal order. alized bodies of women have been the medium,” seems inarguable after she Yet only in Humphreys’s fi ction does sites for much of that contestation. traces the South through its visual Henninger fi nd female characters Discussing works written primarily incarnation in the Civil War, post- actually locking eyes with the male since 1980, Henninger argues that a Reconstruction period, Depression gaze instead of merely acknowledg- number of Southern female authors era, and civil rights movement, with ing its power. The women in this explicitly engage a history of visual particular attention to photographers story consistently refuse to play their representation that has essentialized whose image-making has persistently role, even though they know well gender and confl ated it with region. helped to defi ne the South—James what is expected of them. They rec- In a place where appearance was long Agee, Walker Evans, and Eudora ognize family photographs as frames central to racial “placing,” images Welty, among others. Henninger that threaten to fi x them in time, yet have held an uncalculated power to makes it clear, however, that art they resist being trapped images and tell particular stories and unravel and documentary photographs tell so take “the South’s fi xing of mascu- others. Henninger’s book is a look at only one segment of regional photo- line subject/feminine object positions how the façade of Southernness has graphic history; she is interested as as a problem, rather than as a given.” been visually ordered, as well as an well in self-commissioned and fam- Casting a long shadow on the pe- examination of the fault lines that are ily pictures, images constructed, at ripheries of these texts are the vastly just as clearly part of the picture, if we least in part, by their very subjects. underdeveloped African American look closely enough. Fictional photographs, Henninger female characters who share some of Henninger’s opening chapter, maintains, are likewise the author’s the white women’s levels of aware- “A Short and Selected History of construct, springing as they do out of ness, but never their textual primacy. Photography in the South,” is a re- at least a partial awareness of the po- Henninger begins chapter 3,

Page 22 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Reading the South continued

“Cameras and the Racial Real,” by graphic images that meditate on how its performative, constructed nature? confronting that underrepresenta- communities of people come to un- Focusing on novels by Anne Tyler tion. She observes that “obsessive derstand themselves visually when (Earthly Possessions, 1997), Lee Smith visualization of southern white wom- the images they repeatedly confront (Oral History, 1983), Ann Beattie anhood leads to a myopic and willful and the lives they lead are at odds. (Picturing Will, 1989) and poetry by blindness toward black southerners,” That sense of disconnection applies Natasha Trethewey (Domestic Work, but in turning to the fi ctional photo- equally well to the poor white fi gures 2000 and Bellocq’s Ophelia, 2002), graphs by African American women at the center of Henninger’s fourth Henninger fi nds authors who openly writers, she quickly demonstrates the chapter, “Envisioning ‘White Trash.’” question what the South is, who be- high stakes attached to self-repre- She uses Dorothy Allison’s work, longs to it, and what the function of sentation in these texts. Within the particularly the novel Bastard Out of region and place might be in a world Western tradition of photography, Carolina (1992) and the memoir Two where impermanence and the absence the camera has often functioned as an or Three Things I Know for Sure (1995), of singular reality are acknowledged imperial tool, establishing and then to pose a central question: “How and in fact embraced. That South— reinforcing the boundaries between have poor white bodies, particularly the one we live in—becomes more subject and object, masculine and female bodies, been represented in legible through Henninger’s work feminine, colonizer and colonized. the southern and national imaginar- and infi nitely more complicated in its Yet these are not inherent attributes ies?” Highly conscious of the visual multiple layers of self-awareness. of the camera itself; rather they are tradition of framing Appalachia and cultural signifi ers, and Henninger’s poor white America as the antithesis Kathryn B. McKee point—that the camera sees different of mainstream, middle-class culture, things depending on who operates Allison creates fi ctional photographs it—is driven home by an extended in Bastard and incorporates real ones Farther Along. comparison of the zombie photo- in Two that claim the power of self- By Donald Harington. graphs Hurston took and then in- representation for what Henninger cluded in Tell My Horse (1938) and calls “the queered of southern cul- Milford, Conn.: The Toby those photos made of the same sub- ture.” She invokes here both the Press, 2008. 225 pages. $24.95 ject by a white man, Rex Hardy Jr. In sexual connotation of “queered” and cloth. Hurston’s work, and then that of Julie the broader reference of the term to Dash and Alice Walker, Henninger that labeled “‘deviant’ in a southern It is a bittersweet pleasure to review maintains that we can “begin to trace economy of representation.” Without Donald Harington’s new novel Farther a southern, ‘womanist’ history of narrative, Henninger reminds us, pic- Along—a sense of “ending music” per- African-American reappropriation of tures run the risk of retelling a master vades. The novel is divided into three photography to transgress boundaries narrative they do not intend to serve. parts: Solo for Hair-Comb and Tissue; and reorder representational politics In this chapter, as in the two previ- Duet for Harmonica and French Horn; within the anthropological and liter- ous, she argues compellingly for the and Trio for Harmonica, Hair-Comb ary fi elds.” The persistent racial sub- interconnection of the visual and and Tissue, and Hammered Dulcimer. text of photographs—call to mind the oral, suggesting that the writers And the title is drawn from the fu- any image of a black mammy and a of her study use that intersection to nereal gospel song that says, “Farther white child—means that African challenge directly the history of their along we’ll know all about it. Farther Americans who create pictures representation. along we’ll understand why.” fi nd themselves engaged in a high- That contest over representation Harington (b. 1935) has published ly self-conscious project. Treating moves Henninger into the post-South 13 novels and a book of nonfi ction Julie Dash’s Daughters of the Dust as for her fi nal chapter, where she treats since 1965, and almost all his novels both fi lm (1992) and book (1997), fi ve works that take as their subject are set in the Arkansas Ozarks. A brief Henninger reads the prevalence of women who are themselves photogra- biography may be in order, for to his fi ctional photographs in those texts phers. Invoking Lewis Simpson’s ear- mystifi cation and to the astonishment as the author’s effort to “picture” the ly use of the term “postsouthern” and of his readers Harington remains the subjectivity that white American cul- tracing some of the term’s subsequent most unknown, yet one of the more ture has failed to see. Alice Walker’s nuances, Henninger concludes her critically acclaimed and highly es- works, particularly “Everyday Use” work by posing a question fundamen- teemed, novelists in America. (1994), Meridian (1977), and The tal to contemporary Southern Studies: Though born and reared in Little Temple of My Familiar (1989), are what are the “politics of creation” in Rock, Arkansas, where his fi rst novel, likewise “saturated” with photo- a region now almost fully conscious of The Cherry Pit, takes place, Harington

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 23 Reading the South continued

spent the summers of his youth in the for a majority of Harrington’s fi ction, mountain hamlet of Drakes Creek, which has now been abandoned and where his grandparents ran the gen- nearly wiped from memory. Our her- eral store. As Mississippi’s late novel- oine, a bewitching history professor ist Thomas Hal Phillips said, around named Eliza Cunningham, arrives. the stoves in those general stores She becomes possessed by the spirit farmers and townspeople traded the of the long-dead mistress to the only very best stories. Ozark governor of Arkansas before There something both tragic and Orval Faubus, one of the Ingledews magical happened to Harington. All from previous Harington novels. And around Drakes Creek and the store it is quite possible the ruins of the twanged the musical dialect of the town Stay More cannot be rebuilt. Ozarks before satellite television and There is a great deal of direct and free music downloads taught us how veiled reference to Harington’s previ- else to talk. For Harington, meningi- ous novels in Farther Along. So much tis froze this tune in amber when the that this book seems written primar- disease took his hearing at age 12. ily for the loyal reader who has been a Throughout his writing, the dialect regular traveler on the previous jour- of his Arkansawyers is unique. Some ney with Harington and the residents claim it to be pure in its rendering, of his Stay More. Reading When and it makes a special music progress- Angels Rest or The Pitcher Shower or ing in all his novels. other Harington novels may bring Harington started his academic and Farther Along, a shorter novel than the novitiate into readiness for writing career in the East, where he any of Harington’s other works, one Farther Along. The novel fi ts within taught with John Updike and began a may recall the experience of read- Harington’s insistently quirky and long friendship with William Styron. ing Laurence Sterne’s A Sentimental beautiful body of work, but it is not But he returned to the Ozarks, to Journey or Gustav Flaubert’s the ideal entry novel to the others. Fayetteville and the University of Sentimental Education. Also Farther Along poses some Arkansas. There he often conducted Ending music prevails even challenges to the reader. This is not his coveted classes in art history by though Harington’s narrator steps unique among Harington’s books. He the unforgettable method of asking into Farther Along to roar—“There operates, as Salman Rushdie says of students to write questions on index is no end. THERE IS NEVER ANY Günter Grass, constantly without a cards, and then pass them forward. END.” Harington hates ending books net. In Farther Along, though, the re- From this interaction, amazing lec- and parting ways. In his fourth book, wards of stylistic daring are more subtle tures unfolded. the hillbilly-Macondo romp The than Lightning Bug or The Cockroaches This latest novel, Farther Along, Architecture of the Arkansas Ozarks, of Stay More. Part 1 is a journal of harkens back somewhat to that fi rst Harington switches to future tense sorts from a grumpy, reclusive refugee novel, The Cherry Pit, in which a verbs just to put off the parting of from the antiquities world; in part 2 curator from the East has given up reader, narrator, and characters. the narrator inserts himself so vigor- on life and marriage and returned to While this may sound gimmicky to ously he converses with characters; Arkansas. It is appropriate that end- readers new to Harington, the tech- and part 3 is epistolary. ing music would harken back to the nique does prolong the bittersweet Thanks to the Toby Press, we have fi rst overtures. In rock and roll, even feeling of the inevitable fi nal pages of all 14 books in print. With them in some bluegrass performed live, a book, and he employs this in sev- readers can warm up for the musical ending music consists of the minor, eral novels and even jokes about it in riffi ng of Farther Along. And another augmented, or diminished chords in Farther Along. book, titled Enduring, is forthcoming a crescendo pounded out at the close So what is ending here in Farther (according to Wikipedia), so the bit- of a song. In literature there is end- Along? Our unnamed protagonist, an tersweet pleasure of parting and end- ing music as well, often in the form of antiquities curator, has returned to ing music will surely be prolonged. a whimsically indulgent, short novel his ancestral homeland, the Arkansas with a sort of inward spiral to its jour- Ozarks. He takes up moonshine and Steve Yates ney. Often it comes at the late stages life as a bluff dweller near the ruins of a long, productive career. Reading of the town of Stay More, the setting

Page 24 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Reading the South continued

New York and New Orleans, wintry nights in Poland, and sunny days in Dear American Airlines. Italy. Miles’s narratives are equally By Jonathan Miles. New York: at home in the varied environments and laugh-out-loud funny at points. Houghton Miffl in, 2008. 180 While Bennie has lost much, his pages. $22.00. sense of humor is powerfully intact, The debut novel from Jonathan Miles and Miles’s ability to relate the hilar- proves to be just as timely as it is time- ity of Bennie’s sarcasm is a notable less. Dear American Airlines takes the talent. “The marriage was so brief I reader through the life of protagonist think I used the same bath towel for Bennie Ford in the form of a com- its entire duration.” plaint letter to a faceless air carrier Dear American Airlines is dedicated that has caused the latest misfortune to the memory of Larry Brown, whom in Bennie’s downtrodden life. The Miles considers a surrogate father and novel hit shelves this summer when writing mentor. Brown’s infl uence airlines grounded fl ights, spiked fairs, is apparent in Miles’s attention to and initiated checked-bag fees, mak- situational details and his knack for ing the premise of Bennie’s never- sharing sweet, sad emotion through ending layover in Chicago’s O’Hare straightforward actions and voices. Airport a well-timed topic. Yet the Miles’s passion for words and the act underlying story of Bennie’s internal Stella; and Walenty Mozelewksi, of writing is contemplated and ex- struggle with a life wasted on self-in- the main character of a Polish novel pounded upon throughout the novel, dulged introspection and alcoholism Bennie has been hired to translate. especially by way of Bennie’s job as a makes this narrative of regret and sar- The stories emerge in the form of translator. castic despondency one of universal digressions from the complaint let- Individuals offended by profanity measures. ter, and from each other, providing will want to pass on Dear American Bennie Ford is stranded in O’Hare comic relief, perspective on Bennie’s Airlines and those looking for a read on his way from New York to Los circumstances, and commentary on with an evident beginning, middle, Angeles to attend the wedding of his the American way. and end may grow weary of the di- estranged daughter. To pass the time, Miles’s ability to build characters is gressions that constitute the novel’s Bennie begins writing a scorching re- delightful. He describes Bennie’s father, sequence of events. The digressions, fund request for the cost of his can- the “man from Dixie Pest Control,” as however, bare the heart of the novel celled plane ticket. The letter soon one who “though a hired killer, he had and reveal Miles as a Southern novel- takes a turn through tightly woven the eyes of an old priest, of a dispenser ist on the rise. “I can’t even write a . . transitions to tell of Bennie’s blem- of daily mercenaries, rather than acrid . refund request without detailing my ished past, an anecdote that often poison.” And while Dear American lineage.” sarcastically, and amusingly, refl ects Airlines lacks a traditional plot, the on the present. “How pleasant to anecdotes of the strongly crafted char- Mary Margaret Miller think of the past as something cur- acters advance the story and keep the able, as a benign rather than malig- reader engrossed. During one fl ash- nant cancer, no? Almost as pleasant back to Bennie’s childhood, the reader Book Reviews and Notes by Faculty, a concept as a world in which tickets is taken along on one of Miss Willa’s Staff, Students, and Friends of the costing $392.68 earned you the pas- schizophrenic road trips, where she Center for the Study of Southern sage to your destination on the date and Bennie drive to the “Faraway” Culture printed on the ticket.” (also known as New Mexico) to begin The 180-page letter recounts the a new life as painters and cowboys. The stories of several characters, most road trip turned kidnapping further re- notably ex-poet turned translator, veals Bennie’s complicated relation- Bennie; his schizophrenic and stroke- ship with his mother. ridden mother, Miss Willa; deceased Throughout the novel, the reader is father of Polish decent, Henryk; transported from the cold concourses mother of his child and ex-wife, of O’Hare to warm apartments in 

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 25 New Volumes of The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture Released This Fall

Now that the frenzy that accompanied the world into the South, and vice ver- the 2008 political season has all but sa, creates diversity. Shorter essays in- passed, it is only fi tting that we editors clude cultural biographies of Southern of The New Encyclopedia of Southern industrialists, including Sam Walton Culture look forward from our most re- and James B. Duke, and discussions of cent accomplishment of the Law and various Southern commercial domains, Politics volume and onward toward the such as the music industry, the liquor next volumes in the series, Agriculture industry, and the railroad industry. and Industry (volume 11) and Music Since The New Encyclopedia of (volume 12). These two subjects have Southern Culture will consist of 24 vol- been particularly instrumental in defi n- umes in all, the Music volume repre- ing the South in the global imagination, sents the midpoint in the series. This conjuring images of banjo and cotton much-anticipated volume celebrates pickers alike. Both volumes approach an essential element of Southern life the subjects with a keen eye toward his- and makes available for the fi rst time torical and contemporary trends, and a stand-alone reference to the music publishing the New Encyclopedia as a and music makers of the American series of individual volumes has allowed South. Southern music has fl ourished us to thoroughly address the subjects. as a meeting ground for the traditions Nearly without exception, the ag- of West African and European peoples ricultural and industrial changes that in the region, leading to the evolution have occurred across the South within of various traditional folk genres, blue- the past 20 or so years have been con- grass, country, jazz, gospel, rock, blues, siderable. The Agriculture and Industry and hip-hop. volume elaborates on how—from the With nearly double the number of rise of aquaculture (“fi sh farming”) as a entries devoted to music in the origi- promising and lucrative agricultural in- nal Encyclopedia, this volume, edited dustry, to the tremendous growth of the by Bill C. Malone, a professor of history automotive industry across the region— emeritus at Tulane University, includes the South’s primary economic sources 30 thematic essays, covering topics have transformed into multibranched such as ragtime, zydeco, folk music fes- systems that, today, are at odds with tivals, minstrelsy, rockabilly, white and the centuries-old concepts of agricul- black gospel traditions, and rock. And ture and industry in the South. The it features 174 topical and biographical “Agriculture” section of the volume, entries, focusing on artists and musi- edited by Melissa Walker, the George cal outlets. From Mahalia Jackson to Dean Johnson Jr. Professor of History at R.E.M., from Doc Watson to OutKast, Converse College, takes a historical ap- this volume considers a diverse array proach to addressing these agricultural of topics, drawing on the best histori- changes, with essays covering topics Spalding Distinguished Professor in the cal and contemporary scholarship on such as African American landowners, History of the American South at the Southern music. women’s roles in agriculture, the agri- University of Georgia, takes a simi- The Agriculture and Industry volume cultural practices of Native Americans, lar historical approach to addressing is now available, and the Music volume, and the evolution of the antebellum the ubiquitous industrial changes that available for preorder, will be published plantation into the neoplantation of to- have occurred in the region since the in January 2009. Check the Center’s day, as well as the cultural signifi cance colonial era. Essays cover topics such Web site for updates. of various crops grown across the South, as “Antebellum Industry,” which in- such as apples, peaches, rice, and, of cluded a vast range of products, includ- James Thomas course, cotton. ing hemp, salt, timber, and turpentine, The “Industry” section of the volume, and “Globalization,” how the cultural, edited by James C. Cobb, the B. Phinizy political, and economic integration of

Page 26 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Southern Foodways Register The Newsletter of the Southern Foodways Alliance

“The canned dream of the South is something I’ve resisted my entire career. . . .” —Barry Hannah, as quoted in the November 2008 issue of Garden & Gun John Rosenthal President’s Valedictory Column In early September, my husband, Bill, and I participated in the opening weekend of Biltmore Estate’s fi rst “Field to Table Festival”—a nine-day celebration of the mountain South’s food, wine, music, stories, crafts, and agricultural heritage. We gathered with Biltmore guests and an incredible roster of panelists, most of whom are longtime members of SFA, to discuss the power of food and sense of place. The festival was also an opportunity to explore Biltmore’s historic ties to sustain- able agriculture, a fascinating Appalachian story overlooked in discussions domi- nated by the foodways of the plantation South. Over 100 years ago, the Vanderbilt family oversaw the creation of farms and gardens both to provide the food served in Biltmore’s elegant dining rooms and to feed the estate’s small army of workers. After a devastating week of watching Wall Street come precipitously close to col- lapse, we escaped the barrage of blaming and bailouts for the softly blue silhouettes of the Blue Ridge. In uncertain times and with a presidential election looming, our conversations about soup beans and cornbread, paw paws, and chowchow, chased by stiff drinks of corn whiskey and mellow glasses of Biltmore Estate chardonnay, were heartening. Marcie Cohen Ferris I thought about other historic times of economic distress in this country, when the market collapsed in the 1929 Depression, the fi nancial crisis of the 1980s, and the economic downturn after 9/11. Just as in those unstable times, Southerners gath- ered around the table to restore a sense of balance and to fi nd comfort in food and Folse Award companionship. Throughout our weekend at Biltmore, we enjoyed meals and conversation with He was born in St. James Parish, SFA friends Allan and Sharon Benton, Belinda Ellis, John Fleer, Ronni Lundy, just south of where he lives now in Tim O’Brien and Kit Swaggert, Sarah Fritschner, Mark and Kathy Sohn, and Fred Donaldsonville, Louisiana, right on a Thompson. We spoke about the economy and politics, about the “super-sizing” of big bend of the Mississippi. corn and pigs, and their shift from local farms to large agribusiness. In 1978, John Folse opened the We discussed the need to bring these important discussions to the table at the restaurant Lafi tte’s Landing in SFA symposium, where we must confront the future of the world’s food. Just when Donaldsonville. For the next 20 it all seemed too overwhelming, we came back to what does make sense—Benton’s years he traveled incessantly, intro- fi nely cured Tennessee ham and bacon, Belinda Ellis’s stack cake, Tim O’ Brien song ducing Cajun cuisine and culture to, “Cornbread Nation,” and the eloquent voice of Ronni Lundy, self-proclaimed mem- among other far-fl ung places, Beijing, ber of the “Hillbilly Diaspora,” who described the powerful ties of food and music Moscow, London, and Seoul. in Appalachia. More recently, Folse has distin- We also talked about how women have supported foodways in the region—the guished himself as a public servant. In mountain mothers who each day prepared hot biscuits for their families, women the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina who gathered on summer porches to string and shuck beans, and the women on staff chefs like Folse emerged as leaders, at Biltmore, who skillfully orchestrated the Field to Table Festival. I want to thank feeding the people of their communi- our friends at Biltmore Estate and, in particular, Elizabeth Sims, past president of the ties. In the wake of Hurricane Gustav, SFA board; Travis Tatham, and Heather Serre; chefs Brian Ross, Edwin French, Don Folse led a team that distributed over Spears, Heather Gatesman, and Angela Guiffrida; and at Biltmore Wine Company, 400 tons of food to area shelters. Jerry Douglas. I am grateful for their hospitality, for their leadership in creating a In recognition of these and many historic event dedicated to sustainable tourism, and for their continued support of other attributes and accomplishments, the SFA. the Southern Foodways Alliance presented John Folse with our 2008 Marcie Cohen Ferris Lifetime Achievement Award. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Taste of the South, January 8–11, 2009, at Blackberry Farm beall + thomas photography Join us for Taste of the South, the Columbia, South Carolina annual SFA fundraiser, hosted by • Frank Stitt, Highlands Bar & Blackberry Farm in the foothills of the Grill, Birmingham, Alabama Great Smoky Mountains in Tennessee. • Margaret Ann Toohey and David Each year we honor the Fellowship of Snow, Snow’s Bend Farm, Coker, Southern Farmers, Artisans, and Chefs, Alabama a peer-elected cadre of our region’s most accomplished food professionals. In honor of new Fellow, Emile Fellows inducted to date include: DeFelice, the following chefs will be • Karen and Ben Barker, Magnolia cooking, alongside the talented roster Grill, Durham, North Carolina of chefs at Blackberry Farm: • Allan Benton, Benton’s Smoky Mountain Country Ham, • Mike Davis, Terra, West Madisonville, Tennessee Columbia, South Carolina • Leah Chase, Dooky Chase, New • Donald Link, Herbsaint, Cochon, Orleans, Louisiana New Orleans, Louisiana • Emile DeFelice, Caw Caw Creek • Barry Maiden, Hungry Mother, Pastured Pork, St. Mathews, South Cambridge, Massachusetts Carolina (2008 inductee) • Hilary White, The Hil, Palmetto, • Betsy and Alex Hitt, Peregrine Georgia Farm, Saxapahaw, North Carolina Bill Allin, chef, Cakes & Ale, Decatur, • Sherry and Mark Guenther, Our featured winemakers are Mac and Georgia, guest chef, 2008 Taste of the South. Muddy Pond Sorghum, Monterey, Lil McDonald, Vision Cellars, Windsor, Tennessee California. • Jessica and Jeremy Little, Sweet Spirit providers for the weekend are this country’s most provocative and per- Grass Dairy, Thomasville, Georgia Julian and Preston Van Winkle, Old sistent champion of sustainably and hu- • Louis Osteen, Louis’s, Las Vegas, Rip Van Winkle Distillery, Louisville, manely raised livestock. Nevada Kentucky. For reservations and special SFA-only • Scott Peacock, Watershed, And our Scholar in Residence rates contact Kelley Clark at Blackberry Decatur, Georgia is Bill Niman, founder of Niman Farm: 800-557-8864, kclark@blackber- • Glenn Roberts, Anson Mills, Ranch, proprietor of BN Ranch, and ryfarm.com. SFA Podcasts Online Alan Pike The SFA Viking Range Lecture, fea- turing a conversation with authors Bich Minh Nguyen and Monique Truong and hosted at the University of Mississippi on September 10, 2008, is now available as a podcast. Visit http://podcast.olemiss.edu/show-html. php?csecrn=NCP091107949 and click the link for the Viking Lecture Series to hear it online.

Or visit http://podcast.olemiss.edu/ fi ndcast.php and subscribe to SFA pod- casts on iTunes. Soon after the October 23–26 Southern Foodways Symposium, session podcasts will be available.

Pictured above, during 2008 Viking Range Lecture are, from left, SFA’s Melissa Hall, University of Mississippi professor Katie McKee, guest author Bich Minh Nguyen, SFA director John T Edge, and guest author Monique Truoung. Outlaw Sunday: Celebrating SFA Feeds Literary and Culinary Outlaws the Debate The concept of the trickster is endemic in Southern artistry. Known in native folk- Rock the Debate, a free festival held in lore as coyote, the trickster has lived for years in William Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha. the Ole Miss Grove on September 26, in He is present in the kaleidoscopic Lowcountry legend-making of Padgett Powell. He conjunction with the fi rst Presidential hunts snakes and snipe, biceps and bicuspids bared, with Florida’s Harry Crews. He Debate, included a mix of music, speak- sits at the breakfast nook with poet and songwriter Vic Chesnutt, and slams Cadillac ers, video presentations, display areas, doors with the Atlanta hip-hop group Outkast. games, and, of course, food (curated Two true tricksters are the author Barry Hannah and moonshiner-cum-NASCAR by the SFA). After the festival, several icon and culinary entrepreneur Junior Johnson, both of whom appeared at this year’s thousand folks gathered at the Grove Southern Foodways Symposium, which focused upon regional drink. stage to watch the historic debate Hannah, born in Meridian, Mississippi, matriculated at Mississippi College before live on 14-by-18-foot HD television earning an MA and MFA from the University of Arkansas. At the age of 30, he screens. turned the literature world on its ear with his debut novel Geronimo Rex, which This election cycle, pork barrel spend- won the William Faulkner Prize and earned a National Book Award nomination. ing may be out but spending for pork is Nurtured by Gordon Lish, Hannah’s work became known for its unfl inching glimps- in! Jim ’N Nick’s BBQ sold hundreds of es of Southern life, at turns fecund and fantastical. His sentences, the critics wrote, pulled pork sandwiches. Taylor Grocery “crackled with energy” and were “charged with gunpowder.” Hannah is among the fried catfi sh all day. And, thanks to best we have, on either side of the Mason-Dixon line. Now an Oxford resident, the generosity of the Catfi sh Institute, Hannah is the director of the MFA program at the University of Mississippi. Ole Miss faculty and staff members ate Junior Johnson, born in rural Wilkes County, North Carolina, fi rst made his bones free. Taqueria del Sol came over from behind the wheel, running moonshine for a local bootleg operation. After a stint Atlanta and wowed the assembled with learning the curves on area dirt tracks, Johnson joined a fl edgling stockcar-racing brisket and fried chicken tacos. Chef conglomerate known as NASCAR. Following some initial success, he was tossed John Folse and Company offered up in jail for a year. (John Law caught him working at his father’s still.) Upon getting steaming bowls of Louisiana crawfi sh sprung, he won six races the next year. Johnson went on to 50 NASCAR victories étouffée. Newk’s (an Oxford favorite) in his career, thanks to tenacious driving and the groundbreaking discovery of the rounded out the menu with pimento effects of “drafting” behind another car. He retired from racing in 1966. In the 1970s cheese sandwiches and caramel cake. and 1980s he became a NASCAR racing team owner. These days, he is an entrepre- neur come full circle, selling a line of foods true to his youth—pork skins, country Henry Mencken ham, and, perhaps most notably, his own brand of moonshine. That same outlaw spirit also exists in Southern food—arguably the most storied cuisine in America—if we open our eyes wide enough to see it. There are science-ob- sessed acolytes of Ferran Adria, like Sean Brock of McCrady’s in Charleston, South Carolina. There are big-for-their-britches upstarts like Richard Blais of Atlanta, boiling (and freeze-drying, and sous vide–steaming) the blood of their regional cui- sine with fl air. All are expanding our horizons beyond the so-called new Southern cuisine that has remained static for months of Sundays. They know also that if a thing does not continue to grow, as Dolly Parton once put it, it is “just like last night’s cornbread—stale and dry.”

Timothy C. Davis

SFA Contributors Ashley Hall, an Alabama native and Marcie Cohen Ferris, SFA president, Timothy C. Davis, associate edi- lapsed journalist, sells juice in Atlanta is assistant professor of American tor of the SFA newsletter Gravy, is a for Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant. She Studies at the University of North Charlotte, North Carolina, native cur- is associate editor of the SFA newslet- Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is author rently living in Nashville, Tennessee. ter Gravy. of Matzoh Ball Gumbo: Culinary Tales He has written for magazines includ- of the Jewish South. ing Saveur, Christian Science Monitor, Henry Mencken, a native of the and Mother Jones. South, now lives and writes beyond. Nicholas Herbemont: Pioneer of American Viticulture

“Where wine is most abundant, there is SFA Symposium speaker) David S. government bankrolled vineyards in found the most sobriety.” Shields, to be published this winter by the farmland of the South Carolina —Nicholas Herbemont the University of Georgia Press. Wine Midlands. The poor soils of these sand afi cionados will appreciate Herbemont’s hills, thought to be useless for growing Nicolas Herbemont (1771–1839) could command of wine-growing techniques crops, are actually more than suitable for well be the most infl uential American now considered industry standard. raising wine grapes. Herbemont hoped vigneron that wine enthusiasts have Most notably, Herbemont experiment- to elevate the local economy through never heard of. European wine grapes ed with the grafting of American root- wine production sponsored by the state (aka vitis vinifera) are notoriously dif- stock onto French grape vines, a prac- of South Carolina. “In a few years, this fi cult to grow in the sultry South. tice that 50 years later would save all land, now a desert, would be compara- Since colonial days, humidity and pests of the grape vines of Europe from the tively thickly populated,” he explained, have thwarted the efforts of countless imported scourge of phylloxera. “a green place forever replenishing it- winegrowers. The technical sections are, some- self, convivial and modest, graced with But Nicholas Herbemont, a native of times, a bit tedious for the casual reader, hospitality and refreshed with wine.” the Champagne district of France and but the sections outlining Herbemont’s Predictably, the conservative cot- resident of early 1800s South Carolina, social and agrarian values are surpris- ton planters of the day balked, and could not be deterred. He spent more ing treats. More than a businessman, Herbemont’s utopian vision slowly than two decades of his life tirelessly Herbemont was gentleman scholar, an evaporated from memory. Pioneering tinkering with—and often failing at— ethicist, and “cheerful philosopher,” American Wine offers a straightforward more than 250 varieties of grape vines. who eagerly shared his knowledge (at sketch of a likable, Franco-American His unlikely laboratories were an urban no charge) with any interested party. hybrid of a man, whose mantra—“deal garden in Columbia and several acres Herbemont opposed slavery for both honestly with the land”—still holds at his country house in rural Richland “philanthropic and humanitarian rea- eyebrow-raising relevance today. County. sons” as a “hereditary disease” of the Herbemont’s important writings have cotton-addicted South. And he advo- Ashley Hall been collected into a volume, Pioneering cated sustainable farming and diversi- American Wine, edited by University of fi ed crops. South Carolian professor (and 2008 His most audacious proposal was for

Southern Foodways Alliance

name

company

address

city state zip

telephone fax

e-mail MEMBERSHIP ❏ $50 student ❏ $75 individual ❏ $100 family Please make checks payable to the Southern Foodways Alliance ❏ $200 nonprofit institution ❏ $500 corporation and mail them to the Center for the Study of Southern Culture University, MS 38677.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, VISIT US AT OUR WEB SITE: www.southernfoodways.com or call John T. Edge, SFA Director, at 662.915.5993 or via e-mail at [email protected] Wharton Photographs to Benefi t Gammill Gallery and Center’s Documentary Studies Program Dav i d W hart o n David Wharton has been photograph- ing the rural South since he came to teach at the Center in 1999. To show- case Wharton’s talent and nine years of service to the Center, a dozen of his landscapes are now available for pur- chase. Proceeds will benefi t the Gammill Gallery and the Center’s Documentary Studies Program. The black-and-white images will be available in various sizes. They are gallery-quality digital prints, made from high-resolution scans of the original medium format (2¼" x 3¼") negatives and printed with Epson’s pig- ment-based (three-level black) Ultra Chrome K3™ Ink technology. For more information about the prints or to or- der, please call 662-915-5993 or e-mail us at [email protected]. Look for the images on our Web site (www.olemiss. Confederate Memorial, Okolona, Mississippi, 2001 edu/depts/south).

1. Church and Cotton Field, Coahoma 5. Tractor, Cotton Wagon, and Church, 9. Cotton Gin, Como, Mississippi, County, Mississippi, 1999. Coahoma County, Mississippi, 2001. 2004. 2. Okra Madonna, St. Charles Parish, 6. Storefront Church, Drew, Mississippi, 10. Cotton Wagon and Church, near Louisiana, 2001. 2003. Waterproof, Louisiana, 2004. 3. Confederate Memorial, Okolona, 7. Rural Cemetery and Cotton Field, 11. Abandoned Church, Brunson, South Mississippi, 2001. Tensas Parish, Louisiana, 2003. Carolina, 2005. 4. Church and Speeding Pickup, Bolivar 8. Gentle Store, Limrock, Alabama, 12. Midville Warehouse, Midville, County, Mississippi, 2001. 2003. Georgia, 2006.

Baptism held in a pond behind the Rocky Mount Primitive Baptist Church, Panola County, Mississippi, in 2001; from David Wharton’s 2008 exhibi- tion The Power of Belief: Photographs from the Religious South. Dav i d W hart o n

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 31 16th Annual Mississippi Delta Tennessee Williams Festival to Be a BBC Radio 2 Documentary Colby H. Kullman This year’s 2008 Mississippi Delta Tennessee Williams Festival in Clarksdale, September 26–27, was blessed by the presence of BBC pro- ducer Carmel Lonergan, who taped the entire program for BBC Radio 2, which has an audience ranging from 13 to 17 million in the United Kingdom and via the Internet. Earlier in the year, she traveled to Clarksdale to make ar- rangements for her production and told Panny Mayfi eld, the Festival’s founder and director, “We have always liked the idea of telling his (Williams’s) story, of giving people an understanding of how important and relevant his work remains today. He touches people. It’s powerful storytelling, more powerful than walking into a cathedral.” Lynn Dickson (left) and Johnny McPhail performing scene from Summer and Smoke Williams’s play Orpheus Descending was the focus of the 2008 Festival with the program beginning with a presen- so fl at the Four Seasons could walk Smoke, This Property Is Condemned, Baby tation by Kenneth Holditch on “An abreast of it.” In the Mississippi Delta Doll, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Orpheus Overview of Tennessee’s Delta Plays of Tennessee Williams, Clarksdale fre- Descending, and The Fugitive Kind are all with Special Emphasis on Orpheus quently becomes Glorious Hill and set in the Delta. Amanda Wingfi eld’s 17 Descending.” Quoting Williams, Coahoma County turns into Two River gentlemen callers and Blanche DuBois’s Holditch noted, “The Delta is so big, County. Battle of Angels, Summer and remembrances of her husband’s suicide

Colby H. Kullman at Moon Lake Casino (now Uncle Henry’s Place in Dundee, Mississippi) bring the Delta to life as well. Holditch also commented on the presence of the Delta in Williams’s short plays and his short stories. The importance of the Delta to Williams’s creative genius is not surprising as he lived with his grandparents in Clarksdale for a time when his grandfather was rector of St. George’s Episcopal Church, returned often to visit, and even toured Europe with his grandfather and a group of tourists from the Delta. Immediately following Holditch’s overview was the fi lm version of Orpheus Descending starring Vanessa Redgrave and Kevin Anderson and directed by Peter Hall. Scholars Milly Barranger, Colby Kullman, Rhona Justice-Malloy, Travis Montgomery, Ralph Voss, and Peter Wirth then en- gaged in a discussion of the three fi lmed versions of this play (Battle of Angels, Broadway star Joel Vig visits Oxford after performing at the Tennessee Williams Festival 1940; Orpheus Descending, 1957; and in Clarksdale The Fugitive Kind, 1960) as well as the

Page 32 Fall 2008 The Southern Register 1989 Hall production. Dealing with the main campus of Coahoma Community eternal struggles of good and evil, life College. Monologue competition, scene Call for Papers and death, salvation and damnation, competition, and a “Stella Calling” light and darkness, cleansing and cor- competition as well as awards for Best on Tennessee ruption, this play was fi rst called Battle Costume and a Judges’ Award earn stu- of Angels. A story of loneliness, pas- dents and their high schools $2,500 in Williams and sion, betrayal, and revenge, it recreates prizes. the Orpheus and Eurydice legend and While the drama competition Mississippi Delta places it in the heart of the Mississippi was taking place at CCC, Matthew Distinguished Tennessee Williams Delta. A lively discussion followed Wohlgemuth presented his paper on scholar Philip C. Kolin from the thanks, in part, to the many students blues music in A Streetcar Named Desire. University of Southern Mississippi from Hernando High School who came Milly Barranger explored further the re- will be guest editing the Fall 2009 to the Festival. lationship between the playwright, his issue of Valley Voices devoted to Luncheon at the Cutrer Mansion with agent, and the Orpheus plays. Margaret Williams and the Delta. readings from the Writers Guild as en- Bradham Thornton, highly acclaimed He solicits original (unpublished) tertainment was the fi rst of three mem- editor of Notebooks by Tennessee manuscripts ranging from 18 to 24 orable meals. Nicholas Moschovakis Williams, illuminated the creative pro- pages, following MLA documenta- opened the afternoon with a presenta- cess of Tennessee Williams and his fo- tion, on Williams’s Delta experiences tion of “Tennessee Williams’s American cus primarily on the Delta plays. as refl ected/radicalized in his plays, Blues,” talking about everything from Saturday afternoon included an organ fi ction, poetry, and fi lms. Essays fo- Williams’s collection of one-act blues- recital by David A. Williamson at St. cusing exclusively on Williams’s bi- themed plays, to his planned project George’s Episcopal Church, the dedica- ography as an aperture into the plays of a blues album, to his ideas about tion of the Walk of Fame plaque honor- are discouraged. Instead, potential blues songs. Jim O’Neal then gave an ing Williams outside the former church contributors should ground their overview of Clarksdale, the Mississippi rectory, and porch plays featuring work on critical ideologies that ex- Delta, and popular forms of the blues scenes from Tennessee Williams’s works pand our understanding of the Delta during Williams’s lifetime. performed on the porches of homes in as place, psyche, body, icon, text, or The stars came out early this year the historic district where Williams even fetish. with late afternoon performances show- spent his childhood. Featured this year Note that manuscripts will not casing acoustic blues guitarist Daddy were Johnny McPhail as Big Daddy and be acknowledged or returned. If Rich followed by Williams scenes by Alice Walker as Maggie in scenes from you want to receive an acknowl- actors Marissa Duricko, Jeff Glickman, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof; Clarksdale High edgment, please include a stamped, and Erma Duricko. Two-time Tony School drama students in scenes from addressed postcard. Do not submit Award–winning actress Tammy Grimes The Glass Menagerie; Jeff Glickman an e-copy. E-copies will not be con- and Hairspray star Joel Vig brought this and Sherrye Williams in The Glass sidered. Please send only hard copy theatrical celebration of Tennessee Menagerie; Marissa Duricko, Johnny to Professor Kolin at the address Williams to a close with a presentation McPhail, and Lynn Dickson in Summer below no later than June 1, 2009. of Mr. Williams and Miss Wood by Max and Smoke, and Janna Montgomery Wilk. Once again, these international in Orpheus Descending. Thanks to the Philip C. Kolin stars brought their luster to Clarksdale quality of the performances, enthusiasm Professor of English with productions worthy of Broadway. remained high throughout the entire University of Southern Mississippi The festivities continued with din- afternoon. Box 5037 ner and cocktails at the home of Mike With music by the Wesley Jefferson Hattiesburg, MS 39406-5037 and Tami Barr, the former mansion of Southern Soul Band, a barbecue din- USA Mississippi Governor Earl Brewer. A ner-dance at the Depot Blues Club gourmet feast was created and served by inside historic Clarksdale Station, and Chef Robert Rhymes and the Coahoma an ethnic buffet at the Greyhound Community College culinary students Bus Station, the 2008 Mississippi followed by monologues by Hernando Delta Tennessee Williams Festival was High School students, music by the brought to a dynamic conclusion, giv- Coahoma Community College Gospel ing all who attended an understand- Quartet directed by Kelvin Towers, ing of Tennessee Williams’s Mississippi and a concluding bravura performance Delta, “this extraordinary landscape.” by acclaimed blues musician Charlie Musselwhite. Colby H. Kullman A highlight of the Williams Festival every fall is the drama competition at the Georgia Lewis Theatre on the 

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 33 Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Celebrates Its 30th Year, Calls for Awards Nominations, and Invites New Members The Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters (MIAL) will celebrate its 30th year at a gala awards ceremony on June 13, 2009, at the Lauren Rogers Art Museum in Laurel. Awards honor the achievements of living Mississippians (current residents or former ones with continuing, signifi cant ties to the state). Nominations of artists for juried awards in the categories of visual arts, photography, fi ction, nonfi ction, po- etry, and music composition (concert, popular) will be accepted from now un- til January 15, 2009. Works must have

been shown, published, or performed in Kim Rushing 2008. Judges for the various categories are chosen from outside the state. Among the founders of MIAL were MIAL offi cers and board members pictured at September 2008 meeting are, left to William Winter, Cora Norman, Aubrey right, front row: Bridget Pieschel, Columbus; Marjorie Selvidge, Oxford; Nancy Guice, Lucas, Noel Polk, and Keith Dockery Laurel; Marion Barnwell, Jackson; Nan Sanders, Cleveland; and Dorothy Shawhan, McLean. Recipients are awarded cash Cleveland; second row: Kim Rushing, Cleveland; Aubrey Lucas, Hattiesburg; David prizes and Mississippi-made gifts at Beckley, Holly Springs; Noel Polk, Starkville; Will Long, Greenwood; Mark Wiggs, the annual ceremony. Past winners Jackson; Ann Abadie, Oxford; George Bassi, Laurel; and Shane Gong, Jackson. include Walker Percy, Ellen Douglas, Willie Morris, Tom Rankin, Natasha Anyone may join MIAL. Only mem- comments may be included in support Trethewey, Richard Ford, Samuel Jones, bers may nominate artists for awards of the nomination. Nominators should Lee and Pup McCarty, and Clifton and may nominate more than one in- use the nomination form on page 35. Taulbert. dividual in any category. One page of

MIAL MEMBERSHIP FORM Dues July 1, 2008–June 30, 2009

Name ______

Address ______

City ______State ______Zip ______

E-mail ______Daytime Telephone ______

Check membership dues category: ❏ I am a NEW MEMBER ❏ I am RENEWING my membership ❏ Student - $15 ❏ Individual - $35 ❏ Contributing (couples) - $60 ❏ Sustaining - $125 ❏ Institutional - $150 ❏ Patron - $1,000 Make checks payable to MIAL. Send to Jan Taylor, Treasurer, P.O. Box 2346, Jackson, MS 39225-2346. NOTE: Couples who wish to be listed jointly as members, as in “Mr. and Mrs.” or “Rachel and Adam,” may enroll as Contributing Members or Sustaining Members and will be listed as such on the membership roll. Individuals may also enroll as Contributing or Sustaining members.

Page 34 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Award Categories: Category Chairs POETRY VISUAL ARTS (painting, sculpture, drawing, print, graphic arts, etc.) Eligible JoAnne Pritchard Morris are up to 15 pieces fi rst publicly shown or published in 2008. Submit CD, slides, 801 Arlington Street prints, or published work. Jackson, MS 39202 PHOTOGRAPHY (color, black-and-white, combination) Eligible are up to 15 PHOTOGRAPHY photographs fi rst publicly shown or published in 2008. Submit CD, slides, prints, R. Kim Rushing or published work. 406 South 5th Avenue FICTION (novel, short story, etc.) Eligible is work fi rst published in 2008. Submit Cleveland, MS 38732 author’s name, publisher, title of publication, and date of publication. VISUAL ARTS NONFICTION (any literature that is not fi ctional) Eligible is work fi rst pub- Marjorie Selvidge lished in 2008. Submit author’s name, publisher, title of publication, and date of 405 Lakeview Drive publication. Oxford, MS 38655 POETRY Eligible are up to 15 poems published individually for the fi rst time NONFICTION in 2008, or a collection of at least 15 poems published in book form for the fi rst Dr. Peggy Prenshaw time in 2008 (poems in the collection may have been fi rst published earlier than 105 Cirencester Drive 2008). Submit complete tear sheets or publication. Ridgeland, MS 39157 MUSIC COMPOSITION–Concert (song, opera, composition, instrumental, MUSIC COMPOSITION etc.) This award is for works fi rst published or performed publicly in 2008. Submit Sandra Shellnut evidence of initial performance or publication (book, CD, tape) in 2008. P.O. Box 421 MUSIC COMPOSITION–Popular (blues, country, jazz, rock, etc.) Submit Pass Christian, MS 39571 published scores or the commercial recording fi rst released in 2008. FICTION Deadline: Nominations must be postmarked on or before January 15, 2009. Dr. Bridget Pieschel Attach the artist’s representative work (slides, photographs, CD’s, books, etc.). Southern Women’s Institute Please mail the nomination to the appropriate address according to the awards 1100 College Street, MUW-269 category entered. Mississippi University for Women Columbus, MS 39701 MIAL AWARD NOMINATING FORM - PLEASE PRINT CLEARLY Only MIAL members may nominate. To join MIAL visit our Web site at www.ms-arts-letters.org or use the form on page 34.

NAME OF MIAL MEMBER MAKING NOMINATION

NOMINATOR’S ADDRESS

TELEPHONE: HOME WORK E-MAIL

AWARD CATEGORY MEDIUM

TITLE OF WORK

FIRST SHOWN/PUBLISHED/PERFORMED

NAME OF NOMINEE NOMINEE’S ADDRESS

TELEPHONE: HOME WORK E-MAIL

NOMINEE’S DATE AND PLACE OF BIRTH

NOMINEE’S EDUCATION (SCHOOLS AND DATES GRADUATED, if applicable)

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 35 continued from 1 CONTRIBUTORS eager to build a new society, although bitterness still runs deep among many I’NASAH CROCKETT is a fi rst-year student in the Southern Studies graduate people on both sides. Time in Dublin program. Originally from Atlanta, Georgia, she received her B.A. from Sarah enabled students to see the role of the Lawrence College. Irish Republic, as well as the Northern Irish and British governments, in pro- LISA C. HICKMAN, a Memphis writer and independent scholar, is the author of viding context for rebuilding a society. William Faulkner and Joan Williams: The Romance of Two Writers. Her work ap- The Truth and Reconciliation Com- pears in the Southern Quarterly, the Housman Society Journal, Teaching Faulkner, mission of South Africa is the most fa- Memphis Magazine, Memphis Flyer, and the Sunday Des Moines Register among mous model of reconciliation, and since others. She received her Ph.D. in English from the University of Mississippi. the peaceful end of apartheid in the early 1990s, that nation has offered a DONALD M. KARTIGANER holds the William Howry Chair in Faulkner Studies at dramatic example of a society undergo- the University of Mississippi and is director of the Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha ing change. Dr. Nico Jooste, who works Conference. In addition to his work on Faulkner, he has published articles with international programs at Nelson and book chapters on a number of modernist writers and theorists, including Mandela Metropolitan University, was Conrad, Eliot, W. C. Williams, Kafka, Hemingway, Welty, Philip Roth, Freud, a key fi gure in organizing the entire pro- Kierkegaard, and Murray Krieger. gram, and his lecture on South African history provided a crucial beginning to COLBY H. KULLMAN is professor of English at the University of Mississippi. the group’s visit, which included time Among his publications are articles on Tennessee Williams and other modern in Port Elizabeth, in the mountains dramatists, Theatre Companies of the World, and Speaking on Stage: Interviews near Grahamstown on the Eastern with Contemporary American Playwrights. He is coeditor of Studies in American Cape, in the historic university town of Drama: 1945–Present. Stellenbosch, and in Cape Town. Odie Lindsey, research assistant for The Mississippi Encyclopedia, received an Students met with political leaders MA in Southern Studies at the University of Mississippi. His wrote his thesis and educators but also had the distinc- on the military tradition in 20th-century Southern men’s writing, concentrat- tive opportunity of talking to partici- ing on William Faulkner, James Dickey, and Larry Brown. He previously lived pants in the American and Northern in Chicago, where he taught at Loyola University and the School of the Art Irish civil rights movements and in the Institute of Chicago. He recently moved to Austin where his wife, Maggie Tate, antiapartheid struggle. They saw mu- is enrolled in the PhD program in sociology at the University of Texas. seums in all three societies that told the stories from the past, often revised SALLY CASSADY LYON works at the Center, as the director’s assistant. She is a versions of once white-washed stories Gulfport native and Sewanee graduate. She lives in Oxford with her husband, that omitted groups out of power. They Dalton, an orange tabby cat, Patty MacTavish, a dog, Scout, and a daughter, walked the battlegrounds of Derry’s Lucy Rose Lyon, born October 21, 2008. Bogside Catholic neighborhood and the South African townships where KATHRYN MCKEE is McMullan Associate Professor of Southern Studies and as- the nation’s black majority was brutal- sociate professor of English at the University of Mississippi. She has published ized for so long. They saw women of articles about various Southern writers, including Sherwood Bonner, William the Mississippi Delta and of the South Faulkner, Bobbie Ann Mason, and Josephine Humphreys. She recently coed- African townships working daily with ited a special issue of the journal American Literature called “Global Contexts, young people, providing the education Local Literatures,” and she is currently coediting a volume about representa- and cultural life in areas of continuing tions of the South in fi lm. socioeconomic problems. The reconciliation trip was a compar- TED OWNBY, interim director of the Center, holds a joint appointment in ative project that, in the end, showed Southern Studies and History. He is the author of Subduing Satan: Religion, how far the three societies had come Recreation, and Manhood in the Rural South, 1965–1920 and American Dreams in from the violent divisions of the past. Mississippi: Consumers, Poverty, and Culture, 1830–1998. He is working on a book Charles Reagan Wilson suggested at the about the confl icting defi nitions of family life in the 20th-century South. beginning of the trip that reconciliation For his fi ction STEVE YATES is the recipient of a fellowship from the Arkansas is a process, and the fi rst-hand encoun- Arts Council and two grants from the Mississippi Arts Commission. He has ters of the students brought into focus short stories in recent issues of Valley Voices and Harrington Gay Men’s Literary the differing stages of reconciliation. Quarterly and forthcoming in North Dakota Quarterly and TriQuarterly. He lives in Flowood and is marketing director at the University Press of Mississippi.

Page 36 Fall 2008 The Southern Register Southern Culture Catalog

Faulkner’s Mississippi: Land into Civil Rights in the Delta Legend Journalist Curtis Wilkie in conversa- Transforms the fiction of William tion with Patti Carr Black, Emmett Faulkner’s mythical Jefferson and Till’s cousin Wheeler Parker, Sumner Yoknapatawpha into the reality of residents Frank Mitchener and Betty Oxford and Lafayette County, and Bill Pearson, Henry Outlaw of the Mississippi, with quotations from Delta Center for Culture and Learning Faulkner’s writings correlated with at Delta State University, and former appropriate scenes. The first motion Mississippi governor William F. Winter. pictures inside Faulkner’s home are ht Courtesy Photo March 29, 2006. presented along with rare still photo- Color, 60 minutes. graphs of the writer. Narrated by DVD1148 ...... $20.00 Joseph Cotton. Script by Evans

Friends ...... $18.00 Appeal Commercial Memphis Harrington. Producer, Robert D. Oesterling, University of Mississippi Center for Public Service and Continuing Studies. 1965. Scene at courthouse in Sumner in 1955 Color, 32 minutes. during the Emmett Till murder trial DVD1069 ...... $25.00 Friends ...... $22.50

“Are You Walkin' with Me?” Sister Thea Bowman, William Faulkner, and African American Culture William Faulkner Stamp Ceremony Overview of A 22-cent Literary Arts programs Sister Commemorative stamp honoring Thea presented William Faulkner was issued by the at the annual United States Postal Service during a Faulkner ceremony at the University of Conference Mississippi on August 3, 1987. The from 1980 DVD of this program includes remarks through 1989. by author Eudora Welty, Faulkner’s Produced by daughter, Jill Faulkner Summers, and Lisa N. others. Howorth, Color, 34 minutes. Center for the Study of Southern Culture, 1990. DVD1231 ...... $25.00 Color, 30 minutes. Friends ...... $22.50 DVD 1016 ...... $25.00 Friends ...... $22.50

The Eleventh Oxford Conference for the Book Poster (2001) William Faulkner and Eudora Welty Poster features Richard Wright photograph by Carl Van Vetchen. This film features Eudora Welty at the M9903 ...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 9.00 opening session of the 1987 Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference. The Dain & Cofield Welty reads from her story “Why I Collection Posters Live at the P.O.” and answers ques- High quality 18" x 24" duotone tions about her work and Faulkner’s. posters featuring timeless photo- Color, 34 minutes. graphs of William Faulkner DVD1104 ...... $25.00 Friends ...... $22.50 Dain Poster M1034 . . . $18.95 Cofield Poster M1033 . $18.95 Faulkner’s World Exhibit Poster M1789 ...... $10.00

The Southern Register Fall 2008 Page 37 The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture Sponsored by CHARLES REAGAN WILSON THE CENTER FOR THE STUDY General Editor OF SOUTHERN CULTURE The Center for the Study of Southern Culture is currently in the process of at the University of Mississippi producing The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, consisting of new materi- al based on recent scholarship and updated material first published in the Published by Encyclopedia of Southern Culture. The New Encyclopedia is being released as a series of clothbound and paperback volumes over the next several years, making THE UNIVERSITY OF each individual section of the original edition a handy, one-volume guide for NORTH CAROLINA PRESS those who are interested in a particular subject, as well as making the volumes Chapel Hill more accessible for classroom study. Four to six volumes will be published each year, and the entire collection will contain 24 volumes in all.

CURRENTLY AVAILABLE Volume 7, Foodways. Volume 1, Religion. Samuel S. Hill, editor. John T. Edge, editor. An accessibly written, up-to-date reference to religious culture This volume marks the first ency- in the American South, with topics ranging from religious clopedia of the food culture of the broadcasting and snake handing to Native American religion American South, surveying the and social activism. vast diversity of foodways within HB101.....$39.95 Friends....$35.96 the region and the collective quali- PG102.....$19.95 Friends....$17.96 ties that make them distinctively southern. Volume 2, Geography. Richard Pillsbury, editor. HB107.....$39.95 Friends....$35.96 Grapples with the contestable issue of where the cultural South PB107....$19.95 Friends....$17.96 is located, both on maps and in the minds of Americans. Environment HB102.....$39.95 Friends....$35.96 Volume 8, . Martin PB102...... $19.95 Friends....$17.96 Melosi, editor. Examines how Volume 3, History. the South’s ecol- Charles Reagan Wilson, editor. ogy, physiography, and climate have Examines the evolution of southern history and the influenced southerners—not only as a way our understanding of southern culture has daily fact of life but also as a metaphor for unfolded over time and in response to a variety of understanding culture and identity. events and social forces. HB108.....$39.95 Friends....$35.96 HB103.....$39.95 Friends....$35.96 PB108....$19.95 Friends....$17.96 PB103....$19.95 Friends....$17.96 Volume 9, Literature. Volume 4, Myth, Manners, and Memory. M. Thomas Inge, editor. Charles Reagan Wilson, editor. Includes essays addressing major genres Addresses the cultural, social, and intellectual ter- of literature; theoretical categories such rain of myth, manners, and historical memory in as regionalism, the southern gothic, and the American South. the agrarians; and themes in southern HB104.....$39.95 Friends....$35.96 writing, such as food, religion, and sexuality. Biographical PB104....$19.95 Friends....$17.96 entries introduce southern novelists, playwrights, poets, and critics. Volume 5, Language. HB109.....$39.95 Friends....$35.96 Michael Montgomery and Ellen Johnson, editors. PB109....$19.95 Friends....$17.96 Explores language and dialect in the South, including English Law and Politics and its numerous regional variants, Native American languages, Volume 10, . and other non-English languages spoken over time by the James W. Ely Jr. and Bradley G. Bond, editors. region’s immigrant communities. Combines two of the sections from the original edition. The law HB105.....$39.95 Friends....$35.96 section addresses concepts ranging from law schools to family PB105....$19.95 Friends....$17.96 law, from labor relations to school prayer, and specific legal cases and individuals, including historical legal professionals and par- Volume 6, Ethnicity. Celeste Ray, editor. ties from landmark cases. The politics section covers issues Explores the ways southern ethnic groups perform and maintain such as Reconstruction, social class and politics, and immi- cultural identities through folklore, religious faith, dress, music, gration policy and politics. speech, cooking, and transgenerational traditions. HB110.....$39.95 Friends....$35.96 HB106.....$39.95 Friends....$35.96 PB110...... $19.95 Friends....$17.96 PB106....$19.95 Friends....$17.96 For more catalog offerings, visit www.olemiss.edu/depts/south/our_catalog.html. Books All New, Limited Number of Copies Available Southern Culture Catalog The University of Mississippi International Orders The South: A Treasury of Art and Litera- Barnard Observatory • University, MS 38677 Other video formats ture Phone 800-390-3527 • Fax 662-915-5814 may be available. This richly illustrated volume includes well- Please call for selected texts and images from more than information. Sold To: 300 years of life in the American South. Edited—and signed—by Lisa Howorth. 384 pages; 120 color, 100 black-and-white Name illustrations. Only a few copies of this 1983 publication are left. Cloth. Address B1006 ...... $150.00 Friends ....$135.00 City State Zip Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference Proceedings Country Studies in English, Volume 14 1974 conference papers by Malcolm Cowley, Daytime Phone Elizabeth M. Kerr, and David Sansing along with transcripts of discussions by Joseph Blot- ❏ Payment enclosed (check, money order, international money order in U.S. currency ner, Evans Harrington, and others. Paper. or international check drawn on a US bank; made payable to The Southern Culture Catalog) B1020 ...... $25.00 Friends .....$22.50 ❏ Charge my: ❏ Visa ❏ MasterCard Account # Studies in English, Volume 15 1975 conference papers by Cleanth Brooks, Exp. Date Signature William Boozer, Carvel Collins, Blyden Jackson, Richard Godden, and Elizabeth M. How To Order Delivery Kerr along with transcripts of discussions by By mail: Southern Culture Catalog Orders for delivery in the continental United Victoria Black, Christine Drake, Howard Barnard Observatory • The University of States are shipped by US Postal Service unless Mississippi • University, MS 38677 Duvall, Robert J. Farley, Lucy Howorth, Mary other means of delivery are requested. Orders for delivery outside the continental United McClain, Phil Mullen, William McNeil Reed, By e-mail: Credit Card orders only: States are shipped by Parcel Post. Dean Faulkner Wells, and others. Paper. [email protected] B1021 ...... $25.00 Friends .....$22.50 Shipping and Handling Costs By telephone: Credit Card orders only: United States: $3.50 for first video or other item, 800-390-3527 (Monday-Friday, The South and Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha $1.00 each additional item sent to the same 8:15 a.m.-4:45 p.m. CST) in the US. 1976 conference papers by Daniel Aaron, address. Foreign: $5.00 for each item. Michael Millgate, Darwin Turner, John Outside the US call 662-915-5993 Pilkington, Evans Harrington, Shelby Foote, Posters. United States: $3.50 for any number of Linda Weishimer Wagner, Victoria Fielden By fax: Credit Card orders only: posters sent to the same address. Foreign: Black, and Louis D. Rubin Jr. 662-915-5814 (Daily, 24 hours a day) $10.00 for any number of posters sent to the Paper B1022 ... $15.00 Friends .....$13.50 same address. Cloth B1023 ... $30.00 Friends .....$27.00 All sales are final. No refunds will be made. If an order The Maker and the Myth Return Policy 1977 conference papers by Calvin S. Brown, contains faulty or damaged goods, replacements will be made when such items Albert J. Guerard, Louis P. Simpson, Ilse Du- are returned with problem(s) noted. soir Lind, and Margaret Walker Alexander. Paper B1024 ... $15.00 Friends .....$13.50 Cloth B1025 ... $30.00 Friends .....$27.00 Item # Title/Description Qty. Price Total

Faulkner, Modernism, and Film 1978 conference papers by Malcolm Cowley, Hugh Kenner, Thomas Daniel Young, Horton Foote, Ilse Dusoir Lind, and Bruce Kawin. Paper B1026 ... $15.00 Friends .....$13.50 Cloth B1027 ... $30.00 Friends .....$27.00

Fifty Years of Yoknapatawpha 1979 conference papers by Joseph Blotner, Order Total Michael Millgate, John Pilkington, Merle This form may Wallace Keiser, James G. Watson, Noel Polk, Mississippi residents add 7% sales tax and Thomas L. McHaney. be photocopied. Paper B1028 .. $15.00 Friends .....$13.50 Faxed orders Shipping and Handling Cloth B1029 ... $30.00 Friends .....$27.00 accepted. TOTAL

INCLUDE MAILING LABEL WHEN MAKING ADDRESS CHANGES. ADDRESS MAKING WHEN LABEL MAILING INCLUDE

emtN.76 No. Permit

Senatobia, MS Senatobia,

PAID

.S Postage S. U.

University, MS 38677 MS University,

Non-Profit Org Non-Profit

PRSRT STD PRSRT Center for the Study of Southern Culture Southern of Study the for Center The University of Mississippi of University The

Please help us reduce waste and postage costs. Please give us your correct information: Complete this form and return it with your mailing label, Name or fax it to 662-915-5814. Address ❏ Contact person changed ❏ Name Misspelled City ❏ Address wrong ❏ Received more than one State Zip ❏ Add my e-mail to your list ❏ Delete me from your list E-mail Fax: 662-915-5814 e-mail: [email protected] • www.olemiss.edu/depts/south/ Friends of the Center Your annual donation through our Friends program helps the Center develop and expand our excellent programming. Thank you for your yearly gift to the Friends of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture!

I/We would like to contribute $______to the Friends of the Center right now. Enclosed is my tax-deductible contribution. Annual Memberships: Credit Card: ❏ Patron: $1,000 ❏ Sustaining: $500 ❏ Sponsor: $250 ❑ Visa ❑ MasterCard ❑ AmericanExpress ❏ Associate: $100 ❏ Regular: $50 ❏ Student: $25 Account Number Please fill out the information below when returning this card: Exp. Date Signature

Name (please print)

Address

City State Zip

Day phone Night phone

MAKE GIFTS TO THE CENTER ON-LINE. Go to www.umf.olemiss.edu, click on “Make a Gift,” and direct funds to the Center for the Study of Southern Culture. Center for the Study of Southern Culture • University, MS 38677 • 662-915-5993 • Fax: 662-915-5814 www.olemiss.edu/depts/south/