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THE NEWSLETTER OF THE CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF SOUTHERN CULTURE •SUMMER 2007 THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSISSIPPI Center to Celebrate 30th Anniversary November 8–11, 2007 Kimberly Smith/ Atlanta Journal-Constitution he Center will commemorate Julia Reed 30 years of work with a meeting this fall, November T8–11. Alumni, current students, faculty and staff, Center Advisory Committee members, contributors to Center publications, and Friends of the Center are invited to campus for a celebration of the Center’s achievements and reflections upon its past, present, and future. After several years of on-campus planning, the Center began its work with a Eudora Welty Symposium in November 1977, in which literary critics, teachers, readers, and Miss Welty herself gathered Cynthia Tucker to discuss her work. The Center was founded to document, study, and teach

about the American South at a time Francois Halard Company. A native of Monroeville, when the region was undergoing Thursday, November 8, at 4:00 p.m. in Alabama, Tucker graduated from dramatic social change, and the decades Barnard Observatory. She will look back Auburn University and went on to after witnessed an expansion of Center over the last three decades at the serve as a reporter covering Africa and activities, including development of an development of the South during the Central America, as well as local undergraduate and graduate curriculum, time the Center was studying the region. governments, national politics, crime, preservation projects, encyclopedia and Tucker is a syndicated columnist whose and education. She was a Nieman other book publications, magazines, commentary appears in nearly 50 Fellow at Harvard University in 1988. archival collections, and literary, musical, newspapers across the nation. She won Another featured speaker will be and food conferences and symposia. the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary longtime friend of the Center Julia Reed, Cynthia Tucker, editorial page editor earlier this year. editor at Vogue magazine and author of of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, will Tucker frequently appears on the open the meeting with a talk on Newshour with Jim Lehrer and CNN and (continued on page 3) Southern Register Summer 2k7 8/30/07 10:53 AM Page 2

the D IRECTOR’ S C OLUMN

This column is my Farewell Address. Okay, that is a bit portentous, Published Quarterly by The Center for the Study of Southern Culture not to say pretentious, but the occasion of my last Director’s Column does give me The University of Mississippi license, I hope, to look back. The “Education of a Director” might be the summary Telephone: 662-915-5993 descriptor for my reflections. Fax: 662-915-5814 When I became director in 1998, I knew much about the Center. I had come E-mail: [email protected] here to work on one of our signature projects, the Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, Internet: http://www.olemiss.edu/depts/south and had served as director of the Southern Studies academic program. I was on countless Center committees relating to conferences and publications, wrote grant IN THIS ISSUE Summer 2007 proposals for projects through the Center, and talked frequently with Bill Ferris and Ann Abadie about Center work. 1 Center to Celebrate 30th Anniversary Still, I had much to learn. The Center’s mission is to “investigate, document, 2 Director’s Column interpret, and teach about the American South.” We—those of us at the Center— 3 Bibliography of Mississippi History hammered out that mission statement as a result of a series of meetings I conducted 3 Gammill Gallery Exhibition Schedule with faculty and students, staff, and Advisory Committee members in 1998–1999. I 4 Brown Bag Schedule: Fall 2007 remember the care and sometimes passion with which we discussed the Center, 4 Fullerton Scholarship Endowed even debating at one point whether “utilize” or “use” was the better word at one 5 SST Students Complete Degrees place in the text. (The sentence that needed the just-right word was omitted in the 5 Southern Studies Awards end.) I learned from this process about the broad extent of what the Center does 6 SST Alum Peede Heads NEA Program and how many different constituencies there are. I’ve always emphasized the academic foundation for our pursuit, and I believe 6 Pendarvis 2007–2008 Grisham Writer that point is still essential. The Center works best when our superb faculty and 7 2008 Oxford Conference for the Book students are involved in planning and implementing grant projects and outreach 8 Faulkner’s World Encore Tour programs. We have truly made good use of the many talents of our students, as they 9 2008 F&Y: “The Returns of the Text” have contributed to the development of the William Winter Institute for Racial 9 Marathon Reading of Go Down, Moses Reconciliation, the Southern Foodways Alliance, Living Blues, the Cotton Museum Will Celebrate Faulkner’s Birthday in Memphis, the Southern Cultural Heritage Center in Vicksburg, and countless 10 Another Mississippi Faulkner Story other cultural institutions. Our students have gained valuable experience along the 10 Williams Festival in Clarksdale way that served as a bridge to their own careers. Our faculty members deserve 11 Southern Foodways Alliance News considerable credit for working constructively with students in so many different 14 History Symposium on Anne Firor Scott fields; we all receive an interdisciplinary education from working with them. 14 Mississippi Encyclopedia Entry 1,000 The Center has always attracted talented and hard working staff. Sometimes these 14 Global South Research Group folks seem to drop down from the heavens, just when we need them. Living Blues is a 17 Reading the South: Reviews & Notes good example. This magazine is at the heart of one of the most important Center 21 MIAL Awards Gala projects, the documentation of blues music. Early in my tenure as director, the 22 2007 F&Y: Faulkner’s Sexualities magazine faced a serious financial crisis, but the incisive work of a former staff 22 Percy’s Exhibition at Gammill Gallery member, Andy Beaird, helped figure out what needed to be done. Then Living Blues’s 23 Eighth Faulkner Fringe Festival current publications manager, Mark Camarigg, appeared with the management 24 Notes on Contributors capabilities and passion for the blues to help set the magazine on firm footing. I always heard from our various constituencies. When we made some painful 24 In Memoriam changes at Living Blues, I heard, sometimes raucously, from its fans, some of whom 29 Southern Culture Catalog Items thought I was trying to kill it, when, in fact, we were doing what needed to be done 32 Address Section/Mailing List Form/ Friends Information and Form to revive it. I often meet, on the other hand, members of the Southern Foodways Alliance, which has flourished at the Center under the leadership of our Southern REGISTER STAFF Studies alumnus John T. Edge. The foodies are grateful that we have tried to nurture the Alliance and its engaging work. Of course, I have stayed in touch with Editor: Ann J. Abadie members of our Advisory Committee, going out to visit with individual members Graphic Designer: Susan Bauer Lee from time to time. One of my favorite memories is of committee member Nancy Mailing List Manager: Mary Hartwell Howorth Ashley, who was so taken with her first visit to the Oxford Conference for the Book Editorial Assistant: Sally Cassady Lyon that she came up to me at Taylor Catfish and pledged her fealty to Center work Lithographer: RR Donnelley Magazine Group whenever she could be a part of it. And she has been a wonderfully faithful

The University complies with all applicable laws supporter of our projects, often attending our conferences and other activities. regarding affirmative action and equal opportunity in all One of my goals has long been to help give clarity to Southern Studies, the its activities and programs and does not discriminate against anyone protected by law because of age, color, disability, national origin, race, religion, sex, or status as (continued on page 3) a veteran or disabled veteran.

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(continued from page 2) Director (continued from page 1) 30th Anniversary

interdisciplinary study of the South. I’m Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena. Reed will bring her particularly pleased to be editing our new storytelling facility, pointed humor, and love of the South to bear in speculating on the Center book series, New Directions in future of the region, looking into the coming decades. Reed will speak Friday, Southern Studies, which is pushing that November 9, at 4:00 p.m. in Barnard Observatory. goal along, with two new books published Much of the 30th anniversary meeting will focus on alumni of the Southern this spring by the University of North Studies academic program. The undergraduate program began just after the Carolina Press and more to come. I’m founding of the Center, and the University approved a master’s program in 1986. also especially proud of another of our Panels will bring together graduates to tell about their cultural work. Sessions are recent initiatives, the Future of the South planned around such themes as teaching, museums and archives, journalism, project, which will continue to grow in its business, the law, and writing. influence, bringing together public policy Graduates of the Southern Studies Program have also gone on to earn doctorates issues with a humanities perspective, in various fields, and one panel will give them the opportunity to discuss how they showing that Southern Studies can help built on their interdisciplinary education at the Center in their own scholarly the region chart its future development. careers. The current Southern Studies faculty will be joined by other faculty who I am transitioning into the history have taught in the program over the years to share their thoughts about the department this summer, as the Kelly academic significance of Southern Studies. Gene Cook Sr. Chair in History, but I Plans for the meeting also include inviting back the teachers and scholars who will, of course, continue working on participated in the landmark Ford Foundation project in the late 1980s, which such Center projects as The New worked to incorporate African American Studies and Women’s Studies into the Encyclopedia of Southern Culture and interdisciplinary study of the South. the Mississippi Encyclopedia. I hope my The Center supports and houses diverse projects, and staff members will look own teaching and research and writing back on the development of such activities as Living Blues magazine, the Southern will also contribute to the development Foodways Alliance, documentary studies, and the Center’s work with University of the field of Southern Studies. That Archives, as well as considering such new interdisciplinary initiatives as the Future is a truly collaborative project, as my of the South project and the study of the global South. time as director has been, and I thank In typical Center fashion, the meeting will gather together attendees for such all of the many people who have helped social events as a Saturday “dinner on the grounds” at noon, a Southern Studies me over the years in directing the prom on Saturday night, and a Sunday morning Center golfing finale. multifarious work of the Center. Please check the Center Web site this fall, www.olemiss.edu/depts/south, for CHARLES REAGAN WILSON more details as the meeting approaches. CHARLES REAGAN WILSON Bibliography of Mississippi History Online The Bibliography of Mississippi History, an annotated resource consisting of over three thousand entries, from Abbey to Zmijewsky, is available online through the Mississippi Department of Archives and History’s Web site. The bibliography was compiled by Brenda M. Eagles, who was Research Exhibition Schedule Bibliographer at the Center for the August 20–September 28, 2007 October 1–November 2, 2007 Study of Southern Culture from 1983 to Todd Bertolaet, Bruce West, The Folks Behind the Food: The 1995. She also served as biblio- David Wharton Southern Foodways Alliance Oral graphical editor of the Journal of First Anniversary: Photographs of the History Initiative at Year Three Mississippi Gulf Coast One Year after Photographs from the SFA’s Oral Mississippi History from 1986 to 2002. Hurricane Katrina History Archive In addition to support from the Center, the bibliography was funded November 5, 2007–January 12, 2008 January 15–March 31, 2008 by grants from the American Southern Studies Rob McDonald Association for State and Local Documentary Students Birdhouses History and the Phil Hardin Photographs of Oxford, Mississippi Foundation of Meridian, Mississippi. The Web address is http:// The Gammill Gallery, located in Barnard Observatory, is open Monday opac2.mdah.state.ms.us/eagles2.html. through Friday, 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., except for University holidays. Telephone: 662-915-5993.

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Center for the Study of Southern Culture

SEPTEMBER The University of Mississippi 5 “Oxford’s Leap Frog Program: Giving Children a Hop, Skip, and a Jump Ahead” Brown Bag NOVEMBER Teresa Adams, Director 7 “Photographing an Oxford in Cornelius Arther, Assistant Lunch and Transition: A Documentary Site Director Lecture Series Fieldwork Project” Krystal Stubbs, Site Director Robert Caldwell, Senior Radio Fall 2007 Dispatcher, University 12 “Documentary Fakelore: Physical Plant The Brown Bag Luncheon Series takes Miranda Cully Unmasking the Travel Channel’s place each Wednesday at noon in the Secrets of the Delta Blues” Barnard Observatory Lecture Hall during Jane Harrison Fisher Adam Gussow, Associate the regular academic year. Nelson Griffin Professor of English and Southern Studies Graduate Southern Studies 10 “Southern Spaces: An Internet Students Journal and Scholarly Forum on 19 “Natasha Trethewey: Pulitzer Real and Imagined Places of the 14 “‘Down South’: A View from Poet and Native Daughter” American South” ‘Down Under’” Joan Wylie Hall, English Charles Reagan Wilson, Kelly Sarah Gleeson-White, Instructor Gene Cook Sr. Chair of History Visiting Scholar and Professor of Southern Studies University of New South Wales 26 “Rethinking Race and Writing in Canberra, Australia Rural Schools” 17 “The Folks Behind the Food: The Allison Movitz, English Teacher, Southern Foodways Alliance 28 “Preserving Places of Historical Bruce High School, Codirector of Oral History Value: The L. Q. C. Lamar House Special Programs with the Initiative at Year Three” and the Lafayette County University of Mississippi Amy C. Evans, Oral Historian, Courthouse in Oxford, Writing Project Southern Foodways Alliance Mississippi” Thomas S. Howorth, Architect, OCTOBER 24 “Functional Flora” Howorth & Associates 3 “Fathers, Sons, and Football: A Hilary Shughart, Mississippi Oxford, Mississippi Southern Trilogy” Native Plant Society Wright Thompson, Senior Oxford, Mississippi DECEMBER Writer, ESPN.com 5 “Secret Lives of the Founding Oxford, Mississippi 31 “Thoughts on the New Negro in Fathers” the New South” John Hailman, Assistant U.S. Erin Chapman, Assistant Attorney and Oenophile Professor of History and African Oxford, Mississippi American Studies

Chris Fullerton Memorial Scholarship Endowed

Family and friends of the late Southern of the $10,000 endowment, will Studies alum Chris Fullerton have provide assistance to a master’s student endowed a scholarship in his honor. focusing on African America history Fullerton, a native of Woodbridge, and culture. Alumni and Fullerton Virginia, graduated from the Southern friends are encouraged to continue to Studies master’s program in 1994. He donate to the fund. Checks should be was killed in a car accident in April made payable to the University of 1997, while directing the Friends of Mississippi Foundation/Fullerton Rickwood, a group devoted to the Graduate Fellowship and be sent to the restoration of Rickwood Field in University of Mississippi Foundation at Birmingham, Alabama. P.O. Box 249, University, MS 38677. The scholarship, funded from income Chris Fullerton

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SST Students Complete Degrees Southern Studies This spring the Center awarded eight master’s degrees to students whose research Awards interests varied from varied from opponents of the civil rights movement to recent The Center announced the winners Southern fiction to tourism as a part of economic development. Although of the Southern Studies paper prizes on students are not required to write a thesis in order to graduate—two students, graduation day, May 14, 2007. These Mark Coltrain and Katherine Huntoon, completed internship programs instead— awards, funded by Center donors, honor most do. Below is a listing of the students who completed theses, along with the students for outstanding research and titles of their research. writing on Southern topics. The Gray and Coterie Awards honor Kate Medley, “Fear, Faith, and the Fatherland: The Complexities of Prejudice in the best undergraduate papers on the Civil Rights Movement” Southern Studies. Faculty judge nominated papers, and the winners Amy Schmidt, “‘a little hat dyed precisely to match’: Identity, Performance, and receive a scholarship. The Gray Award Parody in Frances Newman’s The Hard-Boiled Virgin and Dead Lovers Are Faithful was established in 1989 by Center Lovers” supporters Mrs. Homer Earl Gray Jr. and the late Colonel Gray, of Oxford. The Emily Romines, “Soulless Bodies and Bodiless Souls in Escapade, Beloved, and Coterie Award is funded by the Coterie Light in August” Club of Oxford, also a longtime supporter of the Center. Jennifer Gunter is this Maarten Zwiers, “The Paradox of Power: James O. Eastland and the Democratic Party” year’s winner of the Gray Award for her research paper about the free African Odie Lindsey, “Industrial War, Unattainable Manhood, and the Homosocial American community in Lafayette Dynamic in Works by William Faulkner, James Dickey, and Larry Brown” County, Mississippi. Gunter was a 2006 Southern Studies graduate and now lives Mary Margaret Miller, “From King Cotton to Custom Kitchens: Revitalization in in Oxford. James Dent May, a 2007 Downtown Greenwood, Mississippi” Southern Studies graduate from Jackson, is the winner of the Coterie Award for his Internships paper “Images of the Plantation South in Blaxploitation Cinema of the 1970s.” Mark Coltrain, Highway 61 The Lucille and Motee Daniels Award honors the best paper by a Katherine Huntoon, Art Museum, Old Dominion University Southern Studies graduate student. Again, faculty judge nominated papers, and the best paper receives a scholarship. This year’s recipient is Maarten Zwiers, who is from Hollandschaveld, Netherlands. The title of his paper is “Redneck Republicans and Neobourbons: The U.S. Senate Campaigns in Mississippi, 1966 and 1972.” Zwiers graduated with his master’s degree in 2007, but plans to return to Oxford in 2009 to continue researching Mississippi’s politicians. The Aschoff Award honors Peter Aschoff, the deceased anthropology professor whose popular courses on the blues helped make the University a place to come to study music. The award is given for the best student writing on Southern music. Nicholas Neil Gorrell, of Water Valley, Front row from left: Amy Schmidt, Emily Romines, Maarten Zwiers, Mark Coltrain; Mississippi, is this year’s Aschoff back row from left: Odie Lindsey, Morgan Gremillion, Mary Margaret Miller. Receiving recipient for his paper “Son House: B.A. degrees, in addition to Gremillion, were Schuyler Dickson, Jennifer Gunter, and Bluesman, Preacher, Folk Intellectual.” Dent May. Others who completed M.A. degrees are Katherine Huntoon, Kate Medley, and Georgeanna Milam. Gorrell is an English PhD candidate.

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SST Alum Jon Peede Heads NEA Program Tom Roster Southern Studies alum Jon Peede was Festival and wrote educational articles for appointed Director of Literature, the Shakespeare in American Grants Programs at the National Communities and Big Read publications. Endowment for the Arts in July. Peede received his bachelor’s degree In this position, he manages in English from Vanderbilt University applications, panels, and grant awards and his master’s degree in Southern for literature fellowships, as well as grant Studies from the University of awards for literary presses, magazines, Mississippi in 1992. After his time here and organizations. Peede previously in Oxford, he went on to work at served as the Counselor to the Chairman Mercer University Press, Parrish House and also directs the NEA National Books, the Georgia Poetry Circuit, and Initiative Operation Homecoming: Writing Millsaps College in his hometown of the Wartime Experience. Operation Jackson, where he served as Director of Homecoming is a multimedia program Communications and founded Millsaps that preserves the stories of U.S. military Magazine. Most recently, Peede has men and women who served in coedited Inside the Church of Flannery Afghanistan and Iraq and their families, Jon Peede O’Connor: Sacrament, Sacramental, and and consists of 55 writing workshops, an the Sacred in Her Fiction. award-winning anthology from Random historic literary archive. He also managed SALLY CASSADY LYON House, two documentary films, and a the Poetry Pavilion at the National Book Pendarvis Named Grisham Writer for 2007–2008 The 2007–2008 John and Renée Grisham Writer in Residence is Jack Pendarvis. Pendarvis is the author of two books of short fiction, The Mysterious Secret of the Valuable Treasure (2005) and Your Body Is Changing (2007). He is at work on his first novel, Awesome, due in 2008. He writes frequently for McSweeney’s magazine, Wholphin (McSweeny’s Web-based sister), and other publications; has written a screenplay, Dropping Out, which debuted at Sundance Film Festival; and blogs at www.jackpendarvis.blogspot.com. In short, Pendarvis does a bit of everything. The annual appointment at Ole Miss, which includes housing and a stipend, is funded by best-selling author John Grisham and his wife, Renée. Recipients are invited to teach writing workshops and participate in department activities while continuing to write. Pendarvis majored in English at the University of South Alabama in Mobile. He grew up in Bayou La Batre, on the Alabama Coast, and now lives in Atlanta (when he’s not in Oxford) with his wife, Theresa. SALLY CASSADY LYON

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The 15th Oxford Conference for the Book The University of Mississippi • Oxford, Mississippi April 3–5, 2008

Notable authors, editors, speakers is not yet final, but in publishers, educators, literacy addition to those mentioned are advocates, readers, and book artist and arts commentator lovers will gather for the 15th William Dunlap; journalist Hank Oxford Conference for the Klibanoff; Patricia Willis, curator Book, set for April 3–5, 2008. of the Collection of American Beginning on Thursday Literature at Yale’s Beinecke afternoon with two sessions Library; poets Rob Griffith and and a special conference A. Van Jordan; fiction writers edition of Thacker Mountain Christopher Paul Curtis, Radio, the program will Margaret McMullan, Jonathan continue through Saturday Miles, and Jack Pendarvis; afternoon with addresses, Dwight Garner, senior editor of panels, and readings. A fiction the New York Times Book Review, and poetry jam, a marathon and Fredric Koeppel, book review book signing at Square Books, editor of the Memphis Commercial and an optional literary tour of Appeal. the Mississippi Delta (March The 2007 Delta Literary Tour, 31–April 3) are also part of the scheduled for March 31–April 3, festivities. will be based in Greenwood and The 2008 conference is will include visits to Greenville dedicated to writer, folklorist, and Clarksdale as well as an and anthropologist Zora Neale afternoon in Cleveland and a Hurston (1891–1960), who visit to the McCarty pottery in was associated with the Harlem Merigold. The program will Renaissance and who helped include talks on Tennessee bring Southern African Williams’s Baby Doll and on American culture to David Cohn, author of Where I mainstream America through Was Born and Raised, a meditation her field work, novels, short Hurston: Novels and Stories. on the relationship between stories, and dramatic presentations Library of America cover jacket blacks and whites in the Mississippi during the 1930s, ’40s, and ’50s. Since Delta during the 1930s and ’40s. the 1970s Hurston has enjoyed a The Delta tour is $475 per person for revival of interest thanks to admirers all program activities, eight meals, and such as Alice Walker, the Pulitzer legacy. Film adaptations of her fiction local transportation. The fee does not Prize– winning author of The Color and a documentary about her life will include lodging. Only 35 spots are Purple; biographers Robert Hemenway be screened. Other sessions will include available, and they will go fast. Group (Zora Neale Hurston: A Literary an address by literary scholar Jerry accommodations have been arranged Biography) and Valerie Boyd (Wrapped Ward commemorating the 100th at the Alluvian, in downtown in Rainbows); an annual Hurston anniversary of Richard Wright’s birth, a Greenwood (www.thealluvian.com). festival in her hometown of Eatonville, program marking the 40th anniversary Rooms at the Alluvian require a Florida; and enthusiastic teachers and of the death of Martin Luther King Jr., separate registration and are priced at a critics throughout the world. a talk by Masterpiece Theatre producer discounted rate of $155. Rooms may be Critics and scholars will come to the Rebecca Eaton, and a variety of reserved by calling 866-600-5201 and conference to discuss Hurston’s life and readings and panels. The slate of asking for the special “Literary Tour” rate. In the event that the Alluvian sells out before you get a chance to Details about the conference and tour will soon be book a room, call the Greenwood Best posted on www.oxfordconferenceforthebook.com/. Western, 999-455-5770, or the Hampton Inn, 662-455-7985.

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Faulkner’s World: The Photographs of Martin J. Dain Encore Tour A Traveling Exhibition Celebrating the Mississippi Reads Initiative

Exhibition Sponsors Center for the Study of Southern Culture Southern Media Archive Department of Archives and Special Collections The University of Mississippi

The exhibition is financially assisted by the National Endowment for the Humanities through the Mississippi Humanities Council.

Mississippi Reads, a project initiated by sponsors throughout the state, chooses a book by a Mississippi author each year and invites people of all ages to read it. Libraries, schools, and reading groups are encouraged to sponsor discussions, lectures, and other activities focusing on the book. The first book selected by Mississippi Reads, the choice for 2007, is William Faulkner’s Go Down, Moses.

Web site: www.mississippireads.org

E-mail: [email protected]

Mississippi librarians wishing to sign up for the Faulkner’s World exhibition beginning January 2008 should contact Tracy Carr, Center for the Book Coordinator. E-mail: [email protected]. Telephone: 662-432-4450. Fax: 601-432- 4478. Faulkner at his hand-hewn barn

The Mississippi Reads project is partially funded under the federal Faulkner’s World 2007 Exhibition Schedule Library Services and Technology Act administered through the Mississippi March 1–29 June 4–28 September 3–27 Library Commission for the Institution Oxford New Albany Jackson of Museum and Library Services. April 2–27 July 2–27 October 1–31 Ripley Olive Branch Tupelo Mississippi May 1–31 August 1–30 November 5–29 Reads Columbus Ocean Springs Hattiesburg

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Faulkner’s Birthday to Call for Papers Be Celebrated with Marathon Reading of Faulkner & Yoknapatawpha Go Down, Moses “Faulkner: The Returns of the Text” July 20–24, 2008

For a number of years Faulkner criticism, in keeping with literary study generally, has emphasized the significance of various historical and cultural forces as the determining factors of what texts say and how readers interpret them. More recently, there have been signs of a shift reaffirming the formal dimension of literature, the way in which texts assert an original response to culture through their formal qualities. The result has been a fresh attention to the act of reading, that submission to the full complexity of the text that generates what one writer has referred to as “the basic materials that form the subject matter of even the most historical of investigations.” The newer emphasis by no means ignores the cultural context, but instead of approaching the literary text as a reflection, a representation of that context—historical, economic, political, and social—it stresses the role of the text as a challenge to the power of external ideological systems to dictate textual expression. Mississippi Reads posters are available to The 35th annual Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference will examine individuals for $10.00 plus $3.50 postage and Faulkner’s fiction in terms of the texts’ unique renderings of, and responses to, handling. Call 800-390-3527 to order. the historical and cultural conditions in which they were made. Given the extent of Faulkner’s originality, his apparent effort to reinvent prose fiction Happy Birthday to William Faulkner! with each new novel and story, we anticipate a wide range of discussion. What, On September 25, 2007, William for example, is the relationship between his particular strategies of narrative, Faulkner would have celebrated his character, setting, and voice and the construction of original meaning? What 110th birthday. To mark this occasion, generic conventions does Faulkner employ and how does he manipulate them the University of Mississippi will host a according to the presence of specific historical context? In what ways does birthday party at Rowan Oak, the Faulkner’s language move beyond the limits of “argument” toward novelist’s beloved Oxford home. The “performance,” replacing ideologically inflected commentary with a more festivities will include a marathon subjective, freer expression? In short, what we have called the “returns” of the reading of Go Down, Moses, which is the text embrace a return to textual priority, a return that registers a textuality 2007 selection for Mississippi Reads, the sensitive to the historical/cultural context, and return as the profit that such statewide initiative that annually consideration can yield. encourages readers to gather around a We are inviting 40-minute plenary papers and 20-minute panel papers. specific book by a Mississippi writer. Plenary papers consist of approximately 5,000 words and will be in the Go Down, Moses, which was published conference volume published by the University Press of Mississippi. Panel 65 years ago, will be read aloud by papers consist of approximately 2,500 words. volunteers from 7:00 a.m. to approx- For plenary papers the 14th edition of The Chicago Manual of Style should be imately 5:00 p.m., at which time there used as a guide in preparing manuscripts. Three copies of manuscripts must be will be birthday cake, refreshments, and submitted by January 31, 2008. Authors whose papers are selected will receive music by East St. Peter’s Missionary (1) a waiver of the conference registration fee and (2) lodging at the Inn at Ole Baptist Church to honor the author. All Miss from Saturday, July 19, through Thursday, July 24. are invited to this celebration and For short papers, three copies of two-page abstracts must be submitted by encouraged to participate in the marathon January 31, 2008. Authors whose papers are selected will receive a reduction of reading. Volunteers may reserve a reading the registration fee to $100. time by contacting Stephen Monroe by All manuscripts and inquiries should be addressed to Donald Kartiganer, phone at 662-915-1493 or by e-mail at Department of English, The University of Mississippi, University, MS 38677- [email protected]. 1848. Telephone: 662-915-5793, e-mail: [email protected]. Panel abstracts William Faulkner’s 110th Birthday may be sent by e-mail attachment; plenary manuscripts should only be sent by Celebration is sponsored by the regular mail. Decisions for all papers will be made by March 1, 2008. Department of English, the University Museum, and the Center for the Study of Southern Culture.

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In Mississippi, Everybody’s Collection of Richard Freeman Leavitt Got a Faulkner Story A friend in my hometown of Rolling William Faulkner Fork, Mississippi, sent me a copy of a tourism brochure using the photo of , 1950 Faulkner above. It was credited to my late father, Jack Shults, a photographer who sometimes took pictures for the

Deer Creek Pilot county newspaper. I’d never seen this picture or even heard my father mention having taken it—which isn’t surprising since he didn’t care for Mr. Faulkner’s writing (“Now, his brother John, he could Tennessee Williams write a good story you could read”) or his drinking habits (“Tying one on at 2007 Mississippi Delta the camp with the boys is one thing but staggering in front of women in Tennessee Williams Festival broad open daylight is a whole ’nother The 15th annual Mississippi Delta thing”), so I contacted former Tennessee Williams Festival will take schoolmate Ken DeCell, the son of place in Clarksdale on October 12–13, Hal DeCell, the late editor of the Deer 2007. The festival will focus on Creek Pilot. I asked Ken if he knew Williams’s play The Night of the Iguana, Photograph taken by Jack Shults in Rolling Fork, Mississippi, for the anything about the picture. which had its premiere on Broadway in Ken DeCell is an author and senior editor of Washingtonian magazine. He shared 1961 and was adapted to film in 1964 this with me: and again in 2000. The story I grew up with is that your dad [Jack Shults] came into the Pilot office in late As in the past, the festival will include fall of 1950 and told Daddy [Hal DeCell] that Mr. Bill Faulkner had been hunting in presentations by Williams authorities and Sharkey County and was down at the café having breakfast—and because he had just won friends, performances, screenings of the Nobel Prize for Literature, Daddy should go interview him. (I think the café was in the Williams films, a session with papers by block where Sorrell’s Drug Store and Marvin’s Pool Hall used to be, but that could be scholars, and tours of the house and wrong.) neighborhood where the playwright lived Daddy knew Faulkner from Oxford, and knew he didn’t like to be interviewed, so he as a child. Also scheduled in conjunction tried to just strike up a conversation as Faulkner ate and cover the fact that he was a with the festival are workshops for newspaperman. Faulkner was reasonably cordial at first, but he got less voluble the more teachers and for student actors and a questions Daddy asked. drama competition, with prizes totaling Figuring he’d pushed his luck as far as he could, Daddy said, “Mr. Bill, you know, I‘ve $2,500 for the winners. always wondered: Out of all the books, which one is your personal favorite?” Faulkner Cash prizes are given for winning didn’t miss a beat: “I’d have to say that was Lanterns on the Levee.” monologues and scenes, which will be It was press day, so Daddy ran back to the paper, wrote the story on the Linotype—that is, performed for the festival audience. Prize in hot lead—and remade the front page for it. As the last copies were coming off the press, money will go to schools of the winners it suddenly hit Daddy—alas, too late: Lanterns on the Levee, of course, was by William for use with drama activities or library Alexander Percy. books related to theater and literature. To make Faulkner’s joke even more caustic, and probably unknown to most folks, Students, with their teacher-sponsors, Faulkner didn’t like Will Percy. Seems there were hard feelings from years earlier will be given the opportunity to decide when Ben Wasson tried to broker an acquaintance between Faulkner and Percy. how the prize money will be spent. Supposedly, Faulkner was invited for a tennis game at Percy’s home in Greenville Supported by grants from Coahoma but showed up inebriated and barefoot. Community College, the Mississippi Percy instructed Wasson to remove Faulkner from the premises and never bring Arts Commission, and the Mississippi him back. Folks in Greenville still tell the story. Humanities Council, the festival is free MARY DAYLE SHULTS MCCORMICK and open to the public. For brochures and more information contact Coahoma Community College’s Public Relations Department at 662-621-4157.

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SOUTHERN FO ODWAYS REGISTER The Newsletter of the Southern Foodways Alliance

“Nothing is so musical as the sound of pouring bourbon for the first drink on a Sunday morning. Not Bach or Schubert or any of those masters.” —Carson McCullers, Clock without Hands

Symposium and Letter from the President Delta Divertissement Beginning in the early spring, a dedicated group of SFA members met monthly at my home to plan Camp Carolina, an SFA Day Camp staged September 7–9, in and Mark Milestones around Chapel Hill. (To get an idea of what transpired, take a look at the SFA Web page, www.southernfoodways.com.) We gathered around my kitchen table when it The 10th annual Southern Foodways was still frosty outside and gradually moved to the screened porch as the weather Symposium will be held October warmed. 25–28. During this anniversary Looking around the table at one of those meetings, I saw a microcosm of SFA gathering we examine the State of membership. Bill Smith, chef at Chapel Hill’s Crook’s Corner, bikes to my house Southern Food. from the restaurant, as he does throughout town, helping to preserve our bit of We will ponder where we have been ozone. He never fails to visit our table at Crook’s to say hello and meet guests, no and where we are going. We will assay matter how crowded it gets or how stressed I imagine he must be. When he’s not our field of study and think critically working, he’s on the road on book tours or, earlier in the year, in New Orleans, about the SFA’s role in documenting working with John Currence and other SFA volunteers to rebuild Willie Mae and celebrating the diverse food Seaton’s restaurant and home. cultures of the American South. We Sheri Castle is at the table, too. She balances her popular cooking classes at will pay homage to the subjects of our Chapel Hill’s Southern Season, writing, speaking, and oh, yes, being a wife and oral history initiative. We will repay mother, too. And Karen Barker, my co-chair, is calm and visionary in her work for debts of pleasure earned over SFA, while she prepares delectable desserts at her and husband Ben’s Magnolia generations. Grill in Durham, recently nominated for the Outstanding Restaurant Award by the We’re focusing a good bit of James Beard Foundation. Karen takes care of two families—one at home and the attention on our 10th symposium, but other, at her business, a mix of young and seasoned food professionals. this year also marks a milestone for the This is who we are at SFA—hard-working, passionate, and committed to a vision Delta Divertissement. This is year five. for documenting and celebrating the foodways of the American South. I thank you And this edition of the Delta D, set for for all you do to support the important work of the SFA. October 24–25, is more robust, more Congratulations are owed Amy Evans, SFA oral historian, for her important chockablock with cooking classes. work on the Mississippi Delta Hot Tamale Trail. The Mississippi Historical Society Over the course of a 24-hour sojourn recently recognized Amy with the 2006 Elbert R. Hilliard Award for Outstanding to Greenwood, we will ponder the pig, Oral History Project. explore the Mississippi Delta, and gain I am so proud of the many SFA members who were recipients of the 2007 James practical knowledge of Southern Beard Awards, including Best Chef Southeast, Scott Peacock of Watershed in cookery and culture. Decatur, Georgia, and Best Chef South, Donald Link of Herbsaint in New Orleans. Leading the way will be Bay Area Making us all kvell were Matt and Ted Lee, whose Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook won sausage maestro and cookbook author the Beard Award for Cookbook of the Year. Bruce Aidells and New Orleans chef In closing, take a look at our new SFA vision statement, which is now posted on Donald Link of Cochon and Herbsaint. our Web site. It says, “We set a common table where black and white, rich and Details may well be posted online by poor—all who gather—may consider our history and our future in a spirit of the time you read these words. reconciliation.” And as we look forward to celebrating our 10th SFA symposium this fall, isn’t that what it’s all about? Best wishes for an invigorating fall, and let me hear from you.

MARCIE COHEN FERRIS [email protected] Southern Register Summer 2k7 8/30/07 10:55 AM Page 12

Southern Classics: Homage to the Duke

Like many folk in the Carolinas, Amy Evans By 2002, Richard Smart’s son I was brought up on Duke’s Andrew Smart took over the mayonnaise. In fact, considering company and announced plans to that my mother did all the open franchises in four Duke’s- grocery shopping and I spent all friendly Southeast states: South my time bugging her for quarters Carolina, North Carolina, to feed into the little trinket Georgia, and Tennessee. To date, machines and electrified rocking Duke Sandwich Company has horses in the front of the store, I opened four franchise locations never knew there was any other and awarded 11 others in the state brand of mayonnaise until I of South Carolina and four in the started doing my own grocery greater Atlanta, Georgia, area. gathering. It was the first mayo I All of the franchises to date ever ate, and it is still the brand I stay pretty true to the company’s buy to this day, even as I commit original, brown-bag-lunch-style the possible heresy of buying the offerings. There are fresh-made green-label reduced-fat version, grilled cheeses, PB&Js, deviled which I still find quite tasty. egg salad sandwiches, pimento I can’t imagine a summer cheese sandwiches, a sort of high- tomato sandwich without the end deviled ham sandwich, hot slightly acidic taste and creamy dogs, and a straight-out-of-the- consistency of Duke’s. (Indeed, a Junior-League-cookbook friend of mine talked of a tomato concoction, the “exotic” cream sandwich he’d eaten slathered cheese, pineapple, and pecan with Hellman’s and pronounced spread sandwich. it “an affront to the love apple.”) Such rapid expansion banks on Evidently, I’m in good—or at least, offing, “Jarheads” gets my vote) will be a couple of things. First, that folks will infamous—company. The Duke’s Web pleased to learn that there’s even more immediately conjure up images of their site boasts famous aficionados as varied good news on the horizon: an ever- favorite Southern spread when faced as the late race car driver Dale burgeoning chain called the Duke with a Duke’s sign in their nearby strip Earnhardt, TV cook Paula “Y’aula” Sandwich Company. Related to the mall, and secondly, that there’s still a Deen, and golfer Davis Love III. original company but not a subsidiary market out there for nostalgia as it Duke’s is celebrating its 90th (originally, Eugenia Duke, evidently a relates to nourishment. anniversary this year, and it is still hell of a businesswoman, sold her Seeing as Duke’s seems to be made in Greenville, South Carolina, spread recipes to her bookkeeper, Alan cropping up everywhere recently—on where Eugenia Duke whipped up her Hart, and her mayo recipe to one C. F. the Food Network, in Saveur, and, once first batch for Camp Sevier soldiers Sauer), the Duke Sandwich Company again, in the peanut oil section of your stationed in the area back in 1917. first made its name by selling local grocer (poet James Dickey was a Today, Duke’s cranks out nearly 250 sandwiches to textile mills, who would fan, I’ve learned)—I wouldn’t bet jars a minute, but the initial recipe— then sell them to their workers, and against them. Few things inspire save a few additions like the odd soda fountains and drug stores outfitted Southern loyalty like homegrown, preservative—has remained almost with canteens. iconic brands—Sun Drop or Carolina exactly the same: heavy on the egg In 1964, Hart sold the Duke Gold rice, anyone?—and what’s more, yolks—nobody ever said the stuff was Sandwich Company to his wife’s most of these companies have gotten healthy, just delicious—and light on brother, Loran Smart. Richard Smart, by (thrived, even) with very little in the added sugar (as in none added Loran’s son, then took over the family the way of advertising except word of whatsoever). business and, over the next 30-odd mouth and Southern homemaker guilt- Available in parts of Florida, Georgia, years, took the company from a by-disassociation. North Carolina, South Carolina, and wholesale to a retail business, What could be better than a fresh- Virginia, as well as newer locations in establishing several restaurant locations made sandwich slathered with Duke’s? Alabama, Mississippi, Ohio, and throughout the South Carolina upstate, Why, one made for you, of course. Tennessee, Mom’s favorite mayo is now with most of the locations concentrated even available online. around the company’s home base of TIMOTHY C. DAVIS Fans of Duke’s (if a moniker is in the Greenville. Southern Register Summer 2k7 9/4/07 10:26 AM Page 13

ON THE SOUTHERN BBQ TRAIL: Houston, Texas

“Southern barbecue is a proud thoroughbred whose bloodlines are easily traced. Texas barbecue is a feisty mutt with a whole lot of crazy relatives.” —Robb Walsh

Houston’s barbecue traditions of tender brisket and tangy tomato-based sauce come to life on the Texas leg of the Southern Foodways Alliance’s documentary project, the Southern BBQ Trail. Meet Jerry Pizzitola of Pizzitola’s Bar-B-Que, who talks about the early days of the restaurant when pitmaster John Davis was at the helm, and the place was known as Shepard Drive Barbecue. Listen to Roy Burns of Burns Barbecue reminisce about learning to cook in a home economics class at Houston’s Booker T. Washington High School. Get to know George Demeris, who described how his father, Nick Demeris, arrived in Houston from Greece and worked in a relative’s barbecue restaurant before opening Demeris Barbecue with his Levi Goode, Goode Co. Bar-B-Que siblings in 1964. Levi Goode speaks Amy Evans about his father, Jim Goode, and how today. Then follow the Trail to his love for Texas and good brisket Galveston, where Leon O’Neal has inspired him to open Goode Company been smoking meat at Leon’s World’s SFA Contributors Barbecue in 1977. Mary Cook tells the Finest BBQ (and making homemade story of her grandfather, Clennen tea cakes) for more than 20 years. TIMOTHY C. DAVIS is a Charlotte, “Didgy” Swank, and how he created a Visit www.southernbbqtrail.com for North Carolina, native currently mustard-based barbecue sauce while more. living in North Myrtle Beach, South working as a roughneck in the Texas oil Carolina. An MFA student at Queens University, he has written fields in the 1930s; Mary sells his sauce AMY EVANS for magazines including Saveur, Amy Evans Christian Science Monitor, and Jerry Pizzitola, Pizzitola’s Bar-B-Que Mother Jones.

AMY EVANS is oral historian for the Southern Foodways Alliance. She is also an exhibiting artist, freelance photographer, and cofounder of PieceWorks, a nonprofit arts and outreach organization.

MARCIE COHEN FERRIS, SFA president, is assistant professor of American Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is author of Matzoh Ball Gumbo: Culinary Tales of the Jewish South. Southern Register Summer 2k7 8/30/07 10:56 AM Page 14

History Symposium to Focus Global South on Anne Firor Scott Research Group The University’s Interdisciplinary

Chris Hildreth, Duke Photography Working Group on the Global South is The 33rd Porter Fortune Jr. Chancellor’s studying recent theoretical developments Symposium will be held March 19–21, in the humanities and social sciences that 2008 at the University of Mississippi. have lead to fundamental reconcep- The symposium will focus on the tualizations of nation-states and regions. scholarship and career of Anne Firor Three decades ago, dominant approaches Scott, W. K. Boyd Professor Emerita at to regional study emphasized the Duke University and author of the relatively stable and uniform culture of a pioneering work The Southern Lady, region such as the U.S. South, but today published in 1970. The symposium will scholars focus on new linkages between place special emphasis on Professor regions, their geographical flexibility and Scott’s role in helping to launch the cultural hybridity, and the ways cultures field of American women’s history and are impacted by processes of globalization. will assess the field’s trajectory in Last fall, the research group partnered researching areas to which Professor with the Department of History and the Scott has been passionately committed. Center for the Study of Southern Culture Presentations will reflect the diversity of to fund the Porter Fortune Jr. History Professor Scott’s scholarly interests and Symposium, entitled “Going Global: The will include scholarship inspired by her U.S. South and the World.” In addition mentoring, leading, or, in Rutgers Anne Firor Scott to attending four lectures, 50 faculty University Professor Suzanne’s Lebsock’s members from departments across words, “pestering” historians of women to get on with their work. campus, including African American Among those who will speak at the symposium, Jacquelyn Hall will address Studies, Anthropology, Education, writing Southern women’s biographies. Suzanne Lebsock, influenced by the English, Gender Studies, History, Law, devastation of Katrina, will give a paper on a woman from her North Dakota Modern Languages, Music, Religion, hometown who lost all nine of her children during a tornado. Debra Gray White, Sociology, and Southern Studies, Glenda Gilmore, Mary Kelley, Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, Laura Edwards, and Nancy participated in a workshop to discuss the Hewitt will present papers from their ongoing research. impact of globalization on their research Professor Scott taught “Parallel Lives: Black Women and White Women in the and teaching. These workshops identified American South” to a 12-member seminar at the University of Mississippi’s Honors not only the particular interests of faculty College during the summer of 2000. She spoke at the Commissioning Ceremony of the in Global South Studies but revealed the Honors class of 2002 of which the seminar participants were members. The University large-scale interest and enthusiasm takes pride in highlighting Professor Scott’s role in writing women into history. currently circulating on campus with ELIZABETH ANNE PAYNE respect to this new field of study. The Interdisciplinary Working Group on the Global South is now preparing for Entry Number 1,000: Signs of Progress the next stage of its work. Planning is under way for new projects and grant on the Mississippi Encyclopedia proposals that will build on several years of conferences and workshops that have In August we received the 1,000th established the Global South initiative as entry for the Mississippi Encyclopedia, a major new project of Southern Studies when Anna Stanfield Harris, curator of faculty and others across campus. the Ohr-O’Keefe Museum of Art in Ultimately, this research group is Biloxi, sent the entry on potter George interested in how the Global South Ohr. New entries for the project, to be operates within different humanities published by the University Press of disciplines and how faculty may situate Mississippi, arrive every day. globalization and Global South Studies as TED OWNBY curricular and intellectual centerpieces of campus life. George Ohr (1857–1918), the self-styled Mad Potter of Biloxi

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Reading the South Journeyman’s Road: Holman Award given by the Modern Blues Lives from Society for the Study of Southern Faulkner’s Mississippi to Literature. His essays and reviews Post-9/11 New York. have appeared in Southern Cultures, By Adam Gussow. Knoxville: African American Review, Harper’s, University of Tennessee Press, Village Voice, American Literature, 2007. 188 pages. $30.00 cloth. among dozens of other publications. He was a staff writer An award-winning University of on National Public Radio’s Mississippi faculty member and BluesStage show and has also co- author Adam Gussow knows how chaired the Center’s Blues Today to tell the tales of America’s Symposium. Adam and Satan modern blues scene. He lives it. recorded three albums: Living on the He’s played with unknown River (1998), Mother Mojo (1993), musicians, stayed up late for the and Harlem Blues (1991). The band middle-of-the-night jam sessions, is also the subject of a 2007 sought out the smoky clubs, chatted documentary, Satan and Adam, away with street performers, and directed by V. Scott Balcerek and befriended a cast of eccentrics. But Saffire—The Uppity Blues Women, currently in postproduction. for those who know Adam Gussow, says that Adam Gussow “has loved Gussow teaches about the blues none of this is unusual. the blues, lived the blues, studied the here at Ole Miss, with classes Gussow, an associate professor of blues. He honestly describes his ranging from The Blues Tradition English and Southern Studies, journey, the highs and the lows, and, in American Literature to Cultural spent more than a decade in the in turn, leaves the reader a valuable Studies: The Blues Tradition, and mid-1980s and ’90s working the road map.” Krin Gabbard, author of he remains one of the Center’s streets of Harlem and the Black Magic: White Hollywood and most popular instructors among international club circuit with African-American Culture, echoes both undergraduates and master’s Mississippi-born bluesman Sterling that sentiment: “Whether his students. He lives in Oxford with Magee as the duo Satan and Adam. subject matter is a novel by Faulkner his wife, Sherrie, and their son, This collaboration serves as the or the romance of buying an amp, Shaun. backdrop to Journeyman’s Road: his prose is as dynamic as a guitar EDWIN SMITH Modern Blues Lives from Faulkner’s solo by Stevie Ray Vaughan.” The Mississippi to Post-9/11 New York, folks at Square Books in Oxford, published in June by the University Mississippi, call Journeyman’s Road of Tennessee Press. “a bold new vision of where the “I’m proud that this is the first blues have been in the course of the Native Guard: Poems. book about the New York blues 20th century and what it has become By Natasha Trethewey. New York: scene and my participation in it,” at the dawn of the new millennium: Houghton Mifflin, 2006. 64 pages. Gussow says. “With this work, I’m a world music rippling with $22.00 cloth, $13.95 paper. doing everything I can to postmodern contradictions.” deconstruct every bit of mythic Gussow’s other blues books Poetry is unjustly disparaged as thinking about the blues scene. I include Mister Satan’s Apprentice: A opaque or dismissed as irrelevant. want to help people understand Blues Memoir (1998), which Rather, it should be esteemed as a that the blues is not just an received the Keeping the Blues distillation, a rendering with as few American music, but a world Alive Award for Achievement in syllables as possible of the poet’s music.” Literature from the Blues subtle relationship between Gussow’s work has not gone Foundation in Memphis, and Seems experience and significance. unnoticed by his contemporaries. Like Murder Here: Southern Violence Natasha Trethewey commented to Gaye Adegbalola, founding and the Blues Tradition (2002), me that, “poetry is an elegant member of the singing group which won the annual C. Hugh envelope of form.”

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In “Providence,” a seemingly black soldiers were assigned to guard gentle poem in Native Guard, our Confederate war prisoners at Fort humanity, spanning generations Massachusetts on Ship Island. There past and future, is delicately laid is no remembrance, no marker, in before us. After Hurricane Camille tribute to the honor of the Native passed, the narrator recalls as a child Guards on Ship Island. Our history, peering out from the surviving perhaps inconvenient to some, so family home in Gulfport, “beneath left buried on a sandy atoll severed us, nothing I could see/tying us/to from the mainland. Here we have the land./ In the water, our poetry shaming the truth. reflection/trembled,/ disappeared/ On the online Southern media when I bent to touch it.” journal, southernspaces.org, one can The title, “Providence,” points. Is see images of black Civil War it our fate, those of us who live near reenactors returning to Ship Island a coastline, to endure the loss of our as Trethewey reads the poem “Elegy possessions on a frequency to be for the Native Guards.” determined by chance? Maybe, but While all of the poems collected in this reading seems too narrow. Native Guard provide a framework for Another attempt: nature’s reflection for a reader anywhere, there capriciousness will disrupt—fire, is a unique resonance for anyone tsunami, earthquake—anyone’s stepfather, she recalls, “Not the familiar with the Mississippi Gulf comfort anywhere anytime. Maybe, fleeting bruises she’d cover/with Coast. Our Coast acted as a liminal but again this is too narrowly make-up, a dark imprint/of a scope space where boundaries dissolved, and focused. she’d pressed her eye too close Trethewey transitioned to a different Envision a broader canvas. to,/looking for a way out.” intellectual place. From the Must it be a disturbance of a “[L]ooking for a way out,” the introductory poem “Theories of Time physical nature to unmoor us from words saturated with tears and and Space,” “On the dock/where you our piers?: “ . . . our reflection/ regret, sorrow, written by a daughter board the boat for Ship trembled,/disappeared/when I bent with the wisdom of passing time. Island,/someone will take your to touch it.” In the brevity of a few History, like regret, cannot be picture:/the photograph—who you hours, the narrator lost the world as rewritten only uncovered. were—/will be waiting when you she and we knew it, and along with In the second section of Native return.” it our construct of self, it “trembled,” Guard, Trethewey builds upon our “The Coast is a metaphor for primitive and ephemeral, and proud and tragic history of the much of this collection,” explains vanished. Louisiana Native Guards, a black Trethewey. “Our man-made sand “Providence” is an elegy for the Union Civil War regiment. beach overlays the original temporality of the self, our reflection Historian James Hollandsworth mangrove swamp much like we have as we imagine it. relays the facts and movements of layered over our history. The Coast Trethewey touches upon both her the troop in The Louisiana Native has been made much more past and our collective history in Guards: The Black Military vulnerable by the loss of this natural her collection of poems Native Experience during the Civil War. habitat. Too often when we are Guard. Through poetry, Trethewey suggests haunted by our past we attempt to “Yes, Native Guard is in many how we should feel. cover over it. We must look at what ways an autobiography,” agreed “I now use ink/to keep record, a conceals our past to reveal our past.” Trethewey. “In the first and third closed book, not the lure/of We take away from Native Guard sections I deal with the death of my memory—flawed, changeful—that Trethewey’s way of looking at the mother and the interplay between dulls the lash/for the master, world—fresh, wise, instructive, our Southern history and my sense sharpens it for the slave.” Trethewey personal, and selfless. To honor art, of self.” explains, “Using the voice of a we should act. The aim of art, always, In “What Is Evidence,” of her Native Guard soldier, I wore a mask, is to make one a better person. mother’s abuse and subsequent a persona, to express my feelings murder at the hands of her through him.” For a period, these SCOTT NAUGLE

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Tennessee Williams and His Contemporaries. Edited by Robert Bray. Newcastle, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007. 176 pages. $59.99 cloth.

Since the mid-1990s, Tennessee Williams has been the subject of a major biography, a one- volume encyclopedia, essay collections, and important monographs. While his Pulitzer Prize–winning dramas A Streetcar Named Desire (1948) and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955) still attract audiences a quarter- century after his death, many plays unpublished in his lifetime have also been making their way onto the stage and into print. Excellent editions of Williams’s letters and journals have recently become available. In the midst of all this scholarly activity, Tennessee Williams and His Contemporaries is, as Robert Bray promises in the introduction, a valuable and unique volume. The title, however, is not a precise fit for the rich variety within. The eight chapters transcribe topical panels from the Tennessee Williams Scholars Conference, directed by Bray as part of the annual Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival. Although references to Arthur Miller, Samuel Beckett, Harold Pinter, and other contemporary writers do appear throughout, only the final three chapters actually focus on Williams’s relationship to three fellow authors: Carson McCullers, Lillian Hellman, and William Inge. These chapters are well placed at the end of the book because the five preceding chapters give even the best- informed Williams fan a more solid basis for comparing him with such literary contemporaries. The combined effect of the eight transcriptions is powerful. As Bray points out, the speakers’ remarks “represent decades of scholarship”; and “their lively conversations, while planned and measured, offer the additional advantage of providing spontaneous intellectual exchanges that are absent in most critical discourse.” It is tempting to view the participants as a cast of characters, their speeches ranging from a single line to a three-page monologue in this eight-

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act performance. Robert Bray has a acquaint students with the full scope Tennessee Williams,” describes the recurring role as moderator of four of Williams’s work, including his enduring friendship of two Southern sessions; Annette Saddik moderates short fiction, his poetry, and his outsiders who experienced and wrote two segments and is a discussant for nonfiction. Kolin suggests about “unfulfilled desire.” Literary a third panel. Philip Kolin’s organizing a Tennessee Williams form, declining reputations, appearance on five panels makes course around a topic, such as McCarthyism, and poetic sensibility him a central character in the politics, feminism, or ethnicity. are among the subjects of the “Lillian shifting constellation of scholars. Darrell Bourque focuses on themes Hellman and Tennessee Williams” Audience members have their own and motifs, including “escape as session. The closing panel, “William role, entering a few pages before the essential” and “sacred wound.” Film Inge and Tennessee Williams,” calls end of every chapter. clips of a particular scene or for further study of the two popular Chapters 1 and 2 reflect upon “The character can lead students to 1950s playwrights—the repressed Early Plays” and “The Late Plays,” of insights on the major plays. For his author of Picnic and Bus Stop and the which there are scores, most of them World of Tennessee Williams class, transgressive Williams—who unknown to general readers. In the the University of Mississippi’s Colby dramatized sexual dissatisfaction in opening chapter, for example, Brian Kullman likes to discuss Cat on a radically different ways. Parker describes the “huge” pile of Hot Tin Roof’s Big Daddy as Audiences at the Oxford manuscripts known as The Gentleman performed by Burl Ives, Rip Torn, Conference for the Book and the Caller, precursor to Williams’s and Lawrence Olivier. Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha breakthrough play, The Glass In chapter 4, “The Unpublished Conference know that a good panel Menagerie (1945). In a draft, the Tennessee Williams,” Allean Hale discussion can be the highlight of a father of the dysfunctional Wingfield describes the challenges scholars scholarly meeting. Eight times over, family actually appears on stage as a face in editing plays that exist in Tennessee Williams and His shell-shocked World War I survivor multiple manuscript versions; she Contemporaries recreates this who becomes a bootlegger tracked by estimates that about 120 of satisfying experience. bloodhounds. The dogs attack his Williams’s plays are still daughter Laura, rendering her mute unpublished, an amazing statistic. JOAN WYLIE HALL until the victrola’s music pulls her Panelists relate some surprising from her silence. Familiarity with discoveries in the many Tennessee archival holdings enhances the Williams archives from UCLA to panelists’ authority to comment on Harvard. Bray found a western with such issues as innovations in the later “two gay cowpokes,” and Hale cites Russell Lee Photographs: plays. In chapter 2, Annette Saddik an early version of Streetcar Named Images from the Russell Lee observes that, when Williams began Desire set in Chicago with Photograph Collection at the to write “in a different style that was characters named Gladys and Ralph more in keeping with the kind of instead of Blanche and Stanley. Center for American History. experiments of language that were Titles of chapters 5 through 8 Photographs by Russell Lee. being done in the sixties, he was seen suggest a more narrow focus for the Foreword by John Szarkowski. either as an imitator of Beckett and second half of the volume, but Introduction by J. B. Colson. Pinter and Albee” or, alternatively, as “Williams and the Grotesque” and Photographs selected and arranged drunk, drugged, “or as pretentious, the three panels on Williams’s by Linda Peterson. 239 pages. 144 trying to do something that was just contemporaries continue to display duotone plates. Austin: University out of his range.” In fact, the scholars the playwright’s large achievement of Texas Press, 2007. $50.00 cloth. of Tennessee Williams and His and the scholars’ deep understanding American photographer Russell Lee Contemporaries make a collective case of his work. The exploration of the (1903–1986) is best known for his for a sympathetic reception of Clothes grotesque introduces many related work with the Farm Security for a Summer Hotel, Outcry, The subjects, including “camp” Administration’s Historical Section, Gnädiges Fräulein, and other late techniques, the “hystericized body,” the now famous group of government- works. Williams’s fear of becoming insane, employed photographers assigned the Participants in the very practical and “the interpenetration of the task of documenting American life “Teaching Tennessee” session tragedy and the comic” in his drama. during the Great Depression. Lee (chapter 3) stress the need to Chapter 6, “Carson McCullers and never received the recognition

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Reading the South continued

Russell Lee photographing a school session in Italy, 1960

accorded some of his FSA colleagues at the FSA, but it’s mainly devoted (Walker Evans and Dorothea Lange, to later work, done between the in particular), but he was the late 1940s and the mid 1960s. agency’s longest serving and most Anyone with an interest in the productive photographer, American photographic tradition contributing more than 20,000 should be grateful for the images to its file (now archived at publication of these images. Lee the Library of Congress). For the had a sharp eye for the subtle social most part, Lee’s FSA pictures are realities of the American scene straightforward and unpretentious, and a genuine affection for devoted to communicating the ordinary people, so it’s a pleasure realities of their subjects’ lives. They to see this generous—144 pictures are also remarkably humane and in all—new selection of his work. graceful. Even though Lee’s images The photographs are presented may lack the power of Evans’s and quite nicely—one to a page, fairly Lange’s best photographs, they still large (10 inches in the long comprise a compelling and wide- dimension), and in high-quality ranging body of work. duotone reproductions. It’s a This alone, of course, has been handsome book and a valuable more than enough to assure Lee an addition to the in-print history of honored place in the history of American photography. American photography. In Russell My only complaint is with the Lee Photographs: Images from the choice of images. Most of the book Russell Lee Photograph Collection at is devoted to work Lee did in Texas, the Center for American History, where he made his home after however, the University of Texas serving as an army photographer Press has a made a bid to expand during World War II. Many of these Lee’s reputation by publishing pictures are stunning, especially some of his non-FSA work. The those in portfolios devoted to the book includes a few images from state’s Hispanic culture and to the early 1930s, before Lee’s tenure political campaigning in rural areas.

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Reading the South continued

In fact, these photographs are so very Hurricane Blues: Poems and “mouths screaming desperation.” good that one wants to see more of about Katrina and Rita. One poem proclaims, “The Delta’s them, many more. And this leads to Edited by Philip C. Kolin and Susan heart is / broken.” Another includes my complaint: there are too many Swartwout. Cape Girardeau: the unfortunate refrain, “Let the finger pictures from Lee’s travels abroad Southeast Missouri State University pointing begin.” These weak moments (especially a 24-image portfolio from Press, 2006. 181 pages. $17.00 paper. don’t do lasting damage, however, to a a trip he made to Italy in 1960). Put collection that, taken as a whole, bluntly, these photographs are not as In the introduction to Hurricane Blues, provides a thorough and insightful good as the ones made in Texas or the editors quote from Adrienne Rich’s grappling with a major American other parts of the United States. essay “Blood, Bread, and Poetry: The tragedy. What made Russell Lee such a gifted Location of the Poet,” in which Rich One comes away from the chronicler of the American scene was states that we fear poetry because it experience of reading Hurricane Blues his instinctual understanding of might “undermine the safety we have moved by the resiliency of the human American culture and his ability to built for ourselves, and remind us of spirit and its ability to create art out of empathize with ordinary Americans. what is better left forgotten.” The chaos. Memorable images abound, His American pictures, which are the editors are intent on reminding us of such as when Angela Ball presents direct result of Lee’s active what is better left unforgotten. By “Dogwoods full length / on the ground, engagement with a culture he knew doing so, they make vivid again the blooming their funeral.” Maureen very well, testify to this gift. They are devastation hurricanes Katrina and Seaton also provides a richly textured products of unforced, natural seeing Rita caused, and “help us be better picture: “There was a curtain rod with and are wholly lacking in pretense or prepared to face other natural café curtains stuck under the wheel of artifice. The photographs he made in disasters.” The collection is organized my car as if I’d driven into it.” Her other parts of the world, however, into sections called “Looming,” poem ends, “The Diane motel lost its don’t share these qualities. They “Landing,” “City Under Siege, Under roof and its vowels. / I kept myself from often seem watered-down, derivative, Water,” “Aftermath,” “Mourning,” collecting letters from all over the and overly sentimental versions of and “Resolution,” and powerfully beach for this poem.” While a few of other photographers’ work (Paul documents a vast community the poems that criticize the response of Strand, Werner Bischof, and Henri struggling to make sense of misfortune. local and national politicians give way Cartier-Bresson come to mind, as This book, proceeds of which go to screeds, one of the book’s most does the smarmy “Family of Man” toward the relief effort, will help those memorable pieces is a devastatingly photographic aesthetic of the mid- directly affected by the hurricane, but ironic poem by Fred Chappell. In 1950s). It’s almost as if, when also all of us who hope to make sense carefully crafted sing-song tercets, he photographing in cultures other than of the troubling events in the world lilts: “I’ll tell you what I’d do sir if I had his own, Lee became overly conscious and our lives. an enemy / I’d send Mr. Brown and of the picture-making process and The poems collected in the FEMA to give him help for free.” looked too hard for photographs, anthology are written by both Another of the collection’s joys is instead of experiencing and beginning and well-known poets, and “Hurricane Kwame Offers His Two understanding the things he saw on the stylistic range of work is one of the Cents,” by a young performance poet, an intuitive level, as he could in book’s strengths. Some of the poems Tara Betts. Kwame, the speaker in the America, before recording them on portray eyewitness accounts, moving poem, provides unique insight into his film. Don’t misunderstand: Lee’s in their immediacy and passion. Of “cousin Katrina,” who “wanted to see pictures from overseas are just as good course, these qualities of immediacy how tone-cold bitch she could be. / in a technical sense as those he made and passion are the same qualities that You know us hurricanes don’t start off in America, but they’re not as mar some of the work; we’re sometimes as giant / funnel cakes rolling houses intense, or as familiar. They’re faced with more heart than art. This is and trees in sweet death. . . .” photographs made by a stranger an understandable flaw, as it’s difficult As a historical record, and as a rather than a friend, and I’d rather see for a writer to achieve the necessary diverse collection of poems on a more of the friend’s pictures. distance to craft his or her outrage and fascinating topic, Hurricane Blues is sorrow. Weaker poems in the a welcome anthology. DAVID WHARTON collection present predictable, overtelevised images, or speak in the BETH ANN FENNELLY clichés of “heart-breaking anguish”

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MIAL Awards Gala Kim Rushing The Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters (MIAL) held its Annual Awards Gala in Greenwood on June 9, 2007, to celebrate the talents of an extraordinary group of creative Mississippians for outstanding work presented in 2006 or over a lifetime. This year’s winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, Natasha Trethaway, accepted the Poetry Award for Native Guard, her third book of poetry. The Fiction Award went to novelist Richard Ford, for Lay of the Land. Jere Nash and Andy Taggart received the Nonfiction Award for their book, Mississippi Politics: The Struggle for Power, 1976–2006. The paintings of William Dunlap featured in the retrospective book Dunlap earned him the Visual Arts Award. Debra Ferguson Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters 2007 Award winners are (from left) Andy Taggart (Nonfiction, with Jere Nash), William Dunlap (Visual Arts), Natasha Trethewey was the winner of the Photography (Poetry), Myrna Colley-Lee (Lifetime Achievement with husband, Morgan Freeman), Award for her exhibition Vanishing Delta, Debra L. Ferguson (Photography), and Samuel Jones (Musical Composition). Not and Samuel Jones received the Musical pictured are Morgan Freeman, Richard Ford, and Jere Nash. Composition Award for his composition Concerto for Tuba and Orchestra. designed especially for MIAL winners most important resources, her artists, Joining only 10 other Mississippians to by Penny Sanford of Kilmichael, MIAL is privately funded, self- receive the MIAL Lifetime Achievement Mississippi. perpetuating, and nonprofit. Award were Oscar-winning actor Morgan Since 1980 the Institute has given its MIAL welcomes new members, and Freeman and his wife, acclaimed costume prestigious awards to honor the anyone may join. Members only are and set designer Myrna Colley-Lee. The achievements of living Mississippians allowed to nominate individuals for Institute also paid tribute in memoriam (current residents or former ones with awards; nominations will be due January to longtime MIAL board member and continuing, significant ties to the state). 15, 2008, for next year’s awards. beloved Greenwood arts patron Mary This is the only statewide juried arts Membership dues start at $35 for an Jayne Whittington and gave special competition in Mississippi. Recipients individual (students, $15). Membership recognition to Cora Norman, one of receive cash prizes and Mississippi-made dues may be paid by using the form below MIAL’s founders, who has recently retired gifts. The Annual Awards Galas have and mailing a check to MIAL, P.O. Box to Tennessee. been held in towns and cities all around 2346, Jackson, MS 39225-2346. Winners this year were presented the state. Established in 1978 to support, Additional information about MIAL porcelain sculptures titled The Muses, nurture, and recognize one of Mississippi’s may be found at www.ms-arts-letters.org.

Dues July 1, 2007–June 30, 2008 NOTE: Couples who wish to be listed MIAL MEMBERSHIP FORM jointly as members, as in “Mr. and Mrs.” or “Rachel and Adam,” may enroll as Name ______Contributing Members or Sustaining Members and will be listed as such on the Address ______membership roll. Individuals may also enroll as Contributing or Sustaining members. City ______State ______Zip ______

E-mail ______Daytime Telephone ______

Check membership dues category: ❏ Student ...... $15 ❏ Individual ...... $35 ❏ Contributing (couples) . . . $60 ❏ Sustaining ...... $125 ❏ Institutional ...... $150 ❏ Patron ...... $1,000 Make checks payable to MIAL. Send to Margaret Anne Mitchell, Executive Secretary, P.O. Box 2346, Jackson, MS 39225-2346.

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Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha 2007: Faulkner’s Sexualities

The aim of the 34th annual Faulkner and identity dons the character of its opposite; content of Faulkner novels; Elizabeth Yoknapatawpha Conference, as suggested the redefinition of family in the absence Shiver moderated a panel of Oxonians by the pluralization of “sexuality,” was to of the father. Gary Richards reread reminiscing about their experiences explore Faulkner’s fiction in terms of the Faulkner’s New Orleans writing in the with Faulkner and his family. Colby increased sense, both in literary study and context of the homoerotic subculture of Kullman produced Faulkner on the society, of the richness of the term itself. the Vieux Carré in the 1920s; Dawn Fringe, an open-mike session at the Biological sexual identity may still confine Trouard returned to some of Faulkner’s Southside Gallery on the Square. A itself within the alternatives of Male and notorious women characters and found highlight of the conference continued Female, but the possibilities of gender sexual boredom more prominent than to be the “Teaching Faulkner” sessions, identity have become multiple. Standard sexual excitement; Michael Wainwright conducted this year by James B. classifications of gender as either brought the evolutionary theories of Carothers, Charles A. Peek, Terrell L. “straight” or “queer” have become Darwin to bear on the strategies of “sexual Tebbetts, and Theresa Towner. virtually useless as descriptions of selection” in Sanctuary. Other events included two art individual human character, once we take Apparent throughout the conference exhibitions: Faulkner Family Artistic into account the great variety of social, was the uncanny capacity of Faulkner’s Endeavors, a collection of paintings at the cultural, sartorial, and sexual roles and fiction, the bulk of which is at least a University Museum by Maud Falkner and preferences that human beings adopt. half-century old, to reveal aspects of John Faulkner, as well as drawings by Over 150 Faulkner fans and friends human behavior that readers have only William Faulkner, and Terra: A Delta gathered at the University of Mississippi recently been ready to see—indicating Tango in Time, photographs by Lisa in Oxford to hear papers and panel not only the fullness of the fiction, but Bourdeaux Percy at Barnard Observatory. presentations exploring Faulkner’s rich the persistence of readers in trying to The Special Collections section of the and varied depictions of sexual behavior. probe its implications more deeply. John D. Williams Library sponsored a Perhaps the most exciting aspect of the In addition to the scholarly breakfast program for its exhibition Men papers was the constant presence of the dimension of the conference, Roseanna and Women in Faulkner’s World. There reversal of reader expectation. Scholars Whitlow directed a dramatic reading, were also guided tours of North such as Deborah McDowell, John Duvall, Mr. Twain, Meet Mr. Faulkner; Seth Mississippi, an opening buffet at the home and Jamie Harker found in Faulkner’s Berner conducted a session on of Dr. Beckett Howorth Jr., a picnic at work the possibility of love in conditions “Collecting Faulkner,” focusing on the Faulkner’s home, Rowan Oak, and a calculated to breed hate; the existence of book jackets and paperback covers that closing party at Off Square Books. “masks,” in which apparently fixed racial emphasize (or ignore) the sexual DONALD M. KARTIGANER Lisa Percy’s Photography Exhibited at Gammill Gallery

Photographer Lisa Bourdeaux Percy of attempt to affect the land or alter our Greenville exhibited her views of the landscape, and how nature often comes Mississippi Delta at the Center’s Gammill around to efface or change what we have Gallery in Barnard Observatory this done. Terra is an attempt to illustrate this summer. Percy’s 19 black-and-white timeless interplay.” photographs depict landscapes with Delta native Betsy Bradley, director of barbed wire, overgrown pastures, and the Mississippi Museum of Art in Jackson, dilapidated outbuildings. The exhibition, said that Percy’s “photographs offer the titled Terra: A Delta Tango in Time, is the viewer a penetrating, arresting view of the result of her work in the Delta over the heart of the Delta. Her mastery of the last seven years. black-and-white form combines with her Percy said she has been interested in artistic excellence to present a bold, photography since she took her first sensitive new approach to a familiar but college class at Vanderbilt in 1975. Mound View changing landscape.” “Although I grew up in Meridian, I was Prints from Percy’s collection are in college before I spent any time in the available at $200 unframed and $250 Delta,” she said. “When I married in people in this area are to the land, perhaps framed. For more information, call 1990 and moved to Greenville, I was because I married a farmer. Over time, I 662-915-5993. struck by the landscape and became very became aware of this interconnectedness REBECCA LAUCK CLEARY much more aware of how connected the between man and nature, how we

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Faulkner Fringe Festival Celebrates Its Eighth Birthday Inspired by Edinburgh’s Fringe Theatre Festival and Alaska’s Colby Kullman Last Frontier Theatre Conference’s fringe program, the 2007 Faulkner Fringe Festival made way for 18 presentations ranging from “A Rose for Emily” puppets to ballads in honor of various passages from Faulkner’s fiction to a reading of Ike Snopes’s affection for a cow performed in honor of this year’s theme: “Faulkner’s Sexualities.” Each participant was allowed up to 10 minutes of “open mike” time at Southside Gallery on Monday night, July 23rd, beginning at 10:00 p.m. Vickie and Wil Cook’s gallery, which like Square Books has become an artistic center for the Oxford community, was crowded with approximately 70 folks when the program began and with close to 40 remaining until the last presentation was concluded early Wednesday morning. After a full day of scholarly papers, they were anticipating something short, light, and entertaining. They were not disappointed. John and Christine Smith opened the evening with photographs showing the presence of Faulkner in Denver, Colorado. John then spoke on “A Mississippi Hero Visits Trinity Church: Imagining William Faulkner” and Christine on “The Parentheses around the Faulkner Conference.” Don Kartiganer, director of the Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha They narrated their experience of encountering the hymn Conference, played his guitar and sang during the Fringe program. “Lift Every Voice and Sing” in Oxford and Nashville after leaving last year’s Faulkner Conference. Don Kartiganer, fearless leader of the Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha from Faulkner’s fiction and letters. Nancy Ashley, a popular Conference and professional balladeer, then produced his public speaker who specializes in Southern authors, presented guitar and immortalized Faulkner in song with “Barbara images of “Faulkner in a Good Mood,” a version of Faulkner Allen” in honor of Light in August and “The Cruel War” in perhaps not all that well known by many today. Elizabeth honor of The Unvanquished. Richardson then paid tribute to the late Bessie Summers, Irina Y. Kohn, principal of the Golden Fox Puppet who lived in Oxford into her late 90s, attended school with Company, performed a six-minute version of “A Rose for Faulkner, and spoke annually at the conference about her Emily,” which she last presented at the O’Neill Theatre friendship with “Mr. Bill.” Puppetry Conference in Waterford, Connecticut, in June Gerald Inmon read a passage from his first novel, Yocona 2007. Her husband, Sheldon Kohn, manipulated the puppets Puff Adder, which includes an encounter with a famous writer while Irina gave a dramatic reading condensed from very much like William Faulkner; Jon Marc Sens performed Faulkner’s famous short story. The dramaturge for this two of his own poems inspired by Faulkner and Rowan Oak; production was Lenny Pinna. and retired physician Victor Spears read an Elderhostel piece Comedy reigned for the next five minutes as Nancy Peek he wrote as part of his own passion for faux-Faulkner shared a series of amusingly off-center comments on Faulkner enterprises. from her undergraduate students at the University of Keeping in tune with the theme of “Faulkner’s Sexualities,” Nebraska at Kearney. On a serious note, Charles A. Peek Alice Mary Honeycutt brought the evening to an exciting then paid tribute to “Frances Gregory Patterson,” a long-time close by reading Faulkner’s passage about Ike Snopes and his Faulkner Conference supporter who passed away this past affection for a cow. After this, nothing remained to be year. discussed concerning “Faulkner’s Sexualities.” Diversity With “And Now for Something Different,” James B. reigned once again at the annual Faulkner Fringe Festival Carothers told a Faulknerian-style joke about a pig, a pail, an with Faulkner fans eager to sign up in advance for next year’s anvil, and two chickens. Obviously, the Faulkner program. Conference’s Fringe Festival does not take itself too seriously. Professional actors George Kehoe, Rebecca Jernigan, and COLBY H. KULLMAN Janna Montgomery then gave inspiring dramatic readings

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NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS

REBECCA LAUCK CLEARY is a communications specialist in the her husband, Hugh, manage McCormick Book Inn. Opened in Office of Media and Public Relations at the University of 1965 by the McCormick family, the store is Mississippi’s oldest Mississippi. She received a BA in Journalism from the independent bookstore and is known for its Greenville authors’ University in 1997. showcase, extensive Mississippi and Delta titles, and historical collections. BETH ANN FENNELLY is the author of two poetry collections, Open House and Tender Hooks, and a book of essays, Great with SCOTT NAUGLE is a regular contributor to the Sun Herald and Child: Letters to a Young Mother. Her poems have been appeared other publications. He opened Pass Christian Books in 2003. in the Best American Poetry Series volumes in 1996 and 2005, Hurricane Katrina swept away the building that housed the The Pushcart Prize 2001, and other anthologies. She is assistant bookstore, but not the business. Naugle has continued to serve professor of English at the University of Mississippi. customers via the store Web site, rented facilities for signings and book clubs, and delivered books to customers. The new JOAN WYLIE HALL teaches in the English Department at the store opened in Pass Christian/DeLisle on November 1, 2006. University of Mississippi. She is the author of Shirley Jackson: A Study of the Short Fiction and articles on Tennessee Williams, TED OWNBY, interim director of the Center, holds a joint William Faulkner, Grace King, Frances Newman, and other appointment is Southern Studies and History. He is the author authors. of Subduing Satan: Religion, Recreation, and Manhood in the Rural South, 1965-1920 and American Dreams in Mississippi: DONALD M. KARTIGANER holds the William Howry Chair in Consumers, Poverty, and Culture, 1830-1998. Faulkner Studies at the University of Mississippi and is director of the Faulkner Conference. He is the author of The Fragile ELIZABETH ANNE PAYNE is the author of Reform, Labor, and Thread: The Meaning of Form in Faulkner’s Novels and is near Feminism, coeditor of Mississippi Women: Their History, Their completion of a book-length study, “Repetition Forward: A Lives, and director of the Making Do, a project that documents Theory of Modernist Reading.” the lives of women in north Mississippi through interviews, photographs, brief biographies, and video excerpts. She is COLBY H. KULLMAN is professor of English at the University of professor of history at the University of Mississippi. Mississippi. Among his publications are articles on Tennessee Williams and other modern dramatists, Theatre Companies of the EDWIN SMITH is a communications specialist in the Office of World, and Speaking on Stage: Interviews with Contemporary Media and Public Relations at the University of Mississippi. He American Playwrights. He is coeditor of Studies in American received a BA (1980) and an MA (1993) in print journalism Drama: 1945–Present. from the University.

SALLY CASSADY LYON is a Gulfport native and Sewanee CHARLES REAGAN WILSON is Kelly Gene Cook Sr. Chair of graduate. She lives in Oxford with her husband, Dalton, an History and professor of Southern Studies. Among his orange tabby cat, Patty MacTavish, and a dog, Scout. She works publications are Baptized in Blood: The Religion of the Lost Cause at the Center, as the director’s assistant. and Judgment and Grace in Dixie: Southern Faiths from Faulkner to Elvis. Rolling Fork native MARY DAYLE SHULTS MCCORMICK is a lifelong Deltan. She now lives in Greenville, where she helps

In Memoriam

Michel Fabre Doug Marlette Patricia Glen Brown Young Paris, France Hillsborough, North Carolina Oxford, Mississippi October 31, 1933– December 6, 1949– December 28, 1929– August 10, 2007 July 10, 2007 May 6, 2007

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Southern Culture Catalog

2006 Oxford Conference for the Book All New, Limited Number of Copies Available Books White shirt with Baxter Knowlton painting of Shelby Foote. (L, XL, XXL) The South: A Treasury of Art and Literature M1114-A...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 8.50 This richly illustrated volume includes well-selected texts and images from more than 300 years of life in the American South. Edited—and 2004 Oxford Conference for the Book signed—by Lisa Howorth. 384 pages; 120 color, 100 black-and-white White shirt with Baxter Knowlton painting of Walker Percy. (S, L, illustrations. Only a few copies of this 1983 publication are left. Cloth. XL) B1006 ...... $150.00 Friends...... $135.00 M1111...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 8.50 Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference Proceedings 2003 Oxford Conference for the Book Studies in English, Volume 14 White shirt with Miguel Covarrubias illustration of Stark Young. 1974 conference papers by Malcolm Cowley, Elizabeth M. Kerr, and (M, L, XL) David Sansing along with transcripts of discussions by Joseph M9915...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 8.50 Blotner, Evans Harrington, and others. Paper. B1020 ...... $25.00 Friends...... $22.50 2002 Oxford Conference for the Book White shirt with Tennessee Williams illustration from the Studies in English, Volume 15 Photography Collection of the Harry Ransom Center. (XL, XXL) 1975 conference papers by Cleanth Brooks, William Boozer, Carvel M9912-A...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 8.50 Collins, Blyden Jackson, Richard Godden, and Elizabeth M. Kerr along with transcripts of discussions by Victoria Black, Christine 2001 Oxford Conference for the Book Drake, Howard Duvall, Robert J. Farley, Lucy Howorth, Mary White shirt with Karl Van Vechten photograph of Richard Wright. McClain, Phil Mullen, William McNeil Reed, Dean Faulkner (M, L, XXL) Wells, and others. Paper. M9910-A...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 8.50 B1021 ...... $25.00 Friends...... $22.50 2000 Oxford Conference for the Book The South and Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha White shirt with Willie Morris quotation. (L, XL, XXL) 1976 conference papers by Daniel Aaron, Michael Millgate, Darwin M9908 ...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 8.50 Turner, John Pilkington, Evans Harrington, Shelby Foote, Linda Weishimer Wagner, Victoria Fielden Black, and Louis D. Rubin Jr. 1996 Oxford Conference for the Book Paper B1022 ...... $15.00 Friends...... $13.50 White shirt with Benny Andrews painting, Miss Emma. (L, XL) Cloth B1023 ...... $30.00 Friends...... $27.00 M1042-B ...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 8.50 The Maker and the Myth 1995 Oxford Conference for the Book 1977 conference papers by Calvin S. Brown, Albert J. Guerard, Louis White shirt with Howard Finster painting of William Shakespeare P. Simpson, Ilse Dusoir Lind, and Margaret Walker Alexander. from the Collection of David Byrne. (XL) Paper B1024 ...... $15.00 Friends...... $13.50 M1025 ...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 8.50 Cloth B1025 ...... $30.00 Friends...... $27.00 1994 Oxford Conference for the Book Faulkner, Modernism, and Film Green shirt with Walter Anderson Calendar Print, Dec-11. (XL, XXL) 1978 conference papers by Malcolm Cowley, Hugh Kenner, M1022 ...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 8.50 Thomas Daniel Young, Horton Foote, Ilse Dusoir Lind, and Bruce Kawin. 1993 Oxford Conference for the Book Paper B1026 ...... $15.00 Friends...... $13.50 Grey shirts with dark green print, including William Styron Cloth B1027 ...... $30.00 Friends...... $27.00 quotation from 1953 Paris Review. (L, XL) M1018 ...... $10.00 Friends ...... $ 8.50 Fifty Years of Yoknapatawpha 1979 conference papers by Joseph Blotner, Michael Millgate, John Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference Series Pilkington, Merle Wallace Keiser, James G. Watson, Noel Polk, 2007 Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference and Thomas L. McHaney. “Faulkner and Sexualities” – White shirts with William Faulkner Paper B1028...... $15.00 Friends...... $13.50 cartoon in The Scream, 1925, including a quotation from Soldiers’ Cloth B1029 ...... $30.00 Friends...... $27.00 Pay. (M, L, XL, XXL) T-Shirts (Indicate Size) M1118-A ...... $15.00 Friends...... $13.50 Oxford Conference for the Book Series 2006 Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference 2007 Oxford Conference for the Book “Global Faulkner” – White shirts with photograph of Faulkner and White shirt with sepia toned photograph of Larry Brown by Tom daughter Jill embarking for Sweden. (M, L) Rankin. (M, L, XL, XXL) M1115-A...... $15.00 Friends...... $13.50 M1116-A ...... $10.00 Friends...... $ 8.50

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2003 Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Posters Conference Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference Series “Faulkner and the Ecology of the South” – Illustrated with paintings by Glennray Tutor Khaki-colored shirts with John McCrady M1000 – “Faulkner and Religion” (1989) painting, Oxford on the Hill, 1939, M1001 – “Faulkner and the Short Story” (1990) including a quotation from The Bear. (L M1002 – “Faulkner and Psychology” (1991) only) M1003 – “Faulkner and Ideology” (1992) M9917...... $10.00 M1004 – “Faulkner and the Artist” (1993) Friends ...... $ 8.50 Illustrated with paintings by John McCrady M1021 – “Faulkner and Gender” (1994) 2001 Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha M1028 – “Faulkner in Cultural Context” (1995) Conference M1113– “Faulkner’s Inheritance” (2005) “Faulkner and War” – White shirts with Illustrated with a cartoon by William Faulkner Cofield photograph of Faulkner in M1118 – “Faulkner’s Sexualities” (2007) Canadian Air Force uniform, including a Illustrated with a photograph by Martin Dain quotation from A Fable. (M only) M1039 – “Faulkner and the Natural World” (1996) M1106...... $10.00 Illustrated with photographs by Jack Cofield Friends ...... $ 8.50 M1040 – “Faulkner at 100” (1997) M9907 - “Faulkner in the 21st Century” (2000) 1996 Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Illustrated with four photographs by Bern Keating Conference M9098-4 - “Faulkner in America” (1998) “Faulkner and the Natural World” – White Illustrated with a photographs by Odione shirts with Dain photograph of Faulkner M9905 – “Faulkner and Postmodernism” (1999) and a quotation from Absalom, Absalom! Illustrated with a photograph from Budd Studios (L, XL) M1107 – “Faulkner and His Contemporaries” (2002) M1038 ...... $10.00 Illustrated with a photograph from the Cofield Collection Friends ...... $ 8.50 M1015 – “Faulkner and War” (2001) Illustrated with a photograph from the Williams Library M1110-A – “Faulkner and Material Culture” (2004) The Dain & Cofield Collection Illustrated with a photograph from the Commercial Appeal Posters M1115 – “Global Faulkner” (2006) High quality 18" x 24" duotone Regular ...... $10.00 Friends ...... $9.00 posters featuring timeless photographs of William Faulkner Print Dain Poster M1034 . . . $18.95 Faulkner Portrait Full-color reproductions of a watercolor portrait of William Faulkner painted by William C. Cofield Poster M1033 . $18.95 Baggett Jr. are available in a limited edition of 900. The reproductions are 20 inches x 30 Faulkner’s World Exhibit Poster inches including border. M1789 ...... $10.00 M1010...... $50.00 Friends...... $45.00

Civil Rights in the Delta Journalist Curtis Wilkie in conversation with Patti Carr Black, Emmett Till’s cousin Wheeler Parker, Sumner residents Frank Mitchener and Betty and Bill Pearson, Henry Outlaw of the Delta Center for Culture and Learning at Delta State University, and former Mississippi governor William F. Winter. March 29, 2006. Photo Courtesy Color, 60 minutes. DVD1148 ...... $20.00

Friends ...... $18.00 Memphis Commercial Appeal

Scene at courthouse in Sumner in 1955 during the Emmett Till murder trial

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J. B. Murry: Writing in an Unknown Tongue; Reading through the Water Southern Culture Catalog International Orders J. B. Murry, a self- The University of Mississippi Other video formats may educated African Barnard Observatory • University, MS 38677 be available. Please call American visionary for information. from Georgia, Phone 800-390-3527 • Fax 662-915-5814 celebrates ritual Sold To: Deliver To: “writing in the Spirit” and water divination. Name Name These traditional expressions, derived from African influences, occur throughout the Address Address Caribbean, South America, and the American South. This DVD shows Murray performing the City City rituals and includes shots of some of the paintings for which he has gained national recognition. State Zip State Zip This short documentary raises issues about the Country Country relationship between the spiritual and the aesthetic in the art of religious visionaries. By Daytime Phone Daytime Phone Judith McWillie/University of Georgia. 1986. Color, 15 minutes. ❏ Payment enclosed (check, money order, international money order in U.S. currency DVD1145 ...... $15.00 Friends ...... $13.50 or international check drawn on a US bank; made payable to The Southern Culture Catalog) ❏ Charge my: ❏ Visa ❏ MasterCard Account # James “Son” Thomas A renowned Delta blues singer, “Son” Exp. Date Signature Thomas was also a How To Order Delivery gifted clay sculptor. By mail: Southern Culture Catalog Orders for delivery in the continental United Filmed at his home in Barnard Observatory • The University of States are shipped by US Postal Service unless Leland, Mississippi, this Mississippi • University, MS 38677 other means of delivery are requested. Orders treatment juxtaposes for delivery outside the continental United By e-mail: Credit Card orders only: Thomas’s artwork with several musical States are shipped by Parcel Post. performances. It also includes a sequence showing [email protected] how he worked clay to create his famous Shipping and Handling Costs By telephone: Credit Card orders only: sculptures of the human skull. By Judith United States: $3.50 for first video or other item, 800-390-3527 (Monday-Friday, McWillie/University of Georgia. 1986. $1.00 each additional item sent to the same 8:15 a.m.-4:45 p.m. CST) in the US. Color, 17 minutes. address. Foreign: $5.00 for each item. Outside the US call 662-915-5993 DVD1146 ...... $15.00 Posters. United States: $3.50 for any number of Friends ...... $13.50 By fax: Credit Card orders only: posters sent to the same address. Foreign: 662-915-5814 (Daily, 24 hours a day) $10.00 for any number of posters sent to the Voices of Perthshire same address. Voices from Perthshire depicts life on a Return Policy All sales are final. No refunds will be made. If an order Mississippi Delta contains faulty or damaged goods, replacements will be made when such items cotton plantation are returned with problem(s) noted. from 1938 to 1942, as seen through the home movie camera of Emma Knowlton Lytle. Mrs. Lytle donated the Item # Title/Description Qty. Price Total original silent 8mm film to the Southern Media Archive. Producers Karen Glynn and Peter Slade added recorded commentary from both he filmmaker and retired Perthshire farm workers to the film. Voices of Perthshire depicts the full cycle of a cotton crop from breaking the ground, to making a bale, to weaving cloth in the textile mills of North Carolina. (Voices of Perthshire replaces the earlier Raisin’ Cotton production.) Color, 63 minutes. DVD 3001 ...... $25.00 Order Total Friends ...... $22.50 This form may be Mississippi residents add 7% sales tax photocopied. Faxed orders Shipping and Handling accepted. TOTAL

Southern Register Summer 2k7 8/30/07 11:01 AM Page 28

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

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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

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MAKE GIFTS TO THE CENTER ON-LINE. Go to www.umfoundation.com, 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/