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Greenville, Mississippi’s Nationally
Published
Authors Sarah Ferguson
1842-1928
Caroline Stern
1868-1920
Alfred Stone
1870-1955
William Alexander Percy
1885-1942
David Cohn
1894-1960
Lucille Finlay
1897-1984
Ben Wasson
1899-1982
Louise Eskrigge Crump
1903-1968
Hodding Carter, Jr.
1907-1972
Dan Guravich
1908-1997
Anne metcalfe Clark
1909-1990
Betty Werlein Carter
1910-2000
William Attaway
1911-1986
Bern Keating
1915-2004
Shelby Foote
1916-2005
Walker Percy
1916-1990
Charles Bell
Ellen Douglas
John Ray Skates
David Sansing
W. Charles Sallis
Hodding Carter III
Beverly Lowry
Jessie R0senberg Schell
David Berry
Charlotte Hays
Gayden Metcalfe
Princella Wilkerson Nowell
Kate Keating
1948-1971
David w. beckwith
Walt Grayson
Brooks Haxton Kate betterton
Angela Jackson
Nicky Robertshaw
Julia Reed
JIM DEES
W. Hodding Carter IV JOHN BUNTON
with more to come...
AP Photo/Vickie D. King
The Clarion-Ledger
Author Ellen Douglas received lifetime achievement recognition at the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters' 29th annual awards banquet June 14, 2008. Douglas is the pen name of 87-year-old Josephine Haxton, best known for such books as A Family's Affair, and National Book Award nominee Apostles of Light. Her stories, novels and nonfiction are set in Mississippi and deal candidly with race relations, families and the role of women. Her fiction was largely written during her years living in Greenville with her husband, the late Kenneth Haxton. A University of Mississippi graduate, Ellen Douglas joins Eudora Welty, Walter Anderson and Leontyne Price as MIAL lifetime achievement winners. The institute awards writers and artists each year, but rarely bestows lifetime honors. Individual achievements in the arts and a literary career are honored at the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters' 29th annual awards banquet [June 14, 2008]. Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Winners (complete list) One of our favorite quotes from Greenville author David Cohn in God Shakes Creation (1935):
Now Greenville not only reads books avidly, but far worse, it writes them. It has a number of practicing writers dispropor-tionate to the size of its literate population. It is awash with aspirant authors of every kind... Apparently there is a thesaurus under every bed in the community; a novel simmering with every housewife's soup. More sober citizens, however, alarmed by this lush literary renaissance, are fearful of its dangers. If this thing goes on, they ask, who will do the useful work of the town?
Touring Literary Mississippi
Patti Carr Black
Marion Barnwelltours, maps, places, histories, authors
your guide
to one of
the richest literary states
in america
$22.00
|
 Literary Greenville
by Mary Dayle McCormick
Shelby Foote once quipped, “There’s nothing else to do down here, so you write.” Perhaps that’s why he and seven other mid-20th century Greenville authors published nearly one hundred books. Foote also noted that the living presence of poet William Alexander  Percy in the 1930's “was an example of a man who had written and published books, and you not only believed it could be done, you saw it could be done.” Gentleman planter, lawyer, and author of six poetry collections, William Alexander Percy (1885-1942) is best known for his eloquent memoir Lanterns on the Levee. In his music and book filled home, “Mr. Will” hosted some of the world’s great arts figures of the day, sharing their company with his neighbors. |
Greenvillian David Cohn
(1894-1960) was a national journalist, speech writer and author of ten nonfiction books noted for keen social observation and commentary. Cohn writes of Percy as an early mentor who “brought me glimpses of an unsuspected beauty and implanted within me an affection for the classical world.” As a lifelong friend, Cohn declares Percy “humorous, generous in act and attitude,” yet pained by his “heightened intelligence, a too-seeing eye, a too-sensitive ear.” | Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Hodding Carter, Jr. (1907-1972) credited Will Percy with bringing him to the Delta in 1936. Of Percy, Carter said, “He was a poet, mystic, and benefactor of many people ... and h is friendship was the most significant experience of my life.” Carter was publisher and editor of The Delta Democrat Times, a novelist, poet and passionate journalist quoted for his insight into human nature and history, authoring more than twenty major works. |  According to Will’s young cousin and adopted son, Walker Percy (1916-1990), “Uncle Will” was unique, offering a “complete, articulated view of the world as tragic as it was noble." Walker Percy’s six novels and three philosophical essay collections garnered the National Book Award and a P.E.N./Faulkner Award, among other honors, and made the New York Times best seller list twice. |  Shelby Foote (1916-2005) and Walker Percy remained close friends from boyhood until Percy’s death. Foote authored six novels and his masterpiece, the acclaimed triple-volume history The Civil War. Although Foote considered himself primarily a novelist, thanks to his Civil War trilogy and his script and on-screen contributions to Ken Burns’ “Civil War” PBS series, he will be best remembered as an historian. | Canadian Bern Keating (1915-2004) came to the Delta with his bride, Franke, after World War II, basing a global photography career in Greenville. He embraced the local literary atmosphere as he evolved into a prolific nonfiction writer, authoring 26 major books and countless articles on travel and a wide variety of other subjects. His most popular book, Mississippi, was among those works created in collaboration with his wife Franke. | Charles Bell (1916-) was reared in the same culture as classmates W. Percy and Foote. Long after adolescent days spent in Mr. Will’s vast library, Bell developed a distinctive literary career.  An academic scientist as versed in letters as physics, Bell’s bibliography includes three volumes of poetry, two novels and an audio-visual opus, “Symbolic History,” melding science and art. |
Ellen Douglas (1921-), known locally as Josephine Haxton, didn’t become a Deltan until her marriage to Greenville native K enneth Haxton in 1942. By the time the first of her seven dramatic novels was published in 1962, she had spent years with friends such as W. Percy, Foote, Bell, Keating and Carter. Writing and publishing books, she assumed “was what living in small-town Mississippi was supposed to be like.” Her two most recent works are essay collections. | That William Alexander Percy influenced Greenville’s literary heritage is clear, but who most inspired him? A graduateof University of the South and Harvard Law School, he declared in Lanterns on the Levee that no greater beacon shined in his youth than Miss Caroline Stern (1868-1920). Of the consummate Greenville educator, Percy wrote, “I learned more from her of what the good life is and of how it may be lived than from almost anyone else.” Miss Carrie achieved only local recognition as a poet and painter, but no one can measure the breadth of her success as the “Mother of Greenville Authors.” |
The historical marker outside W. A. Percy Memorial Library in downtown Greenville was unveiled by Bern and Franke Keating in October 0f 2002. This plaque commemorates eight mid-20th century authors embodying Greenville’s literary legacy:
William Alexander Percy (1885-1942)
David Cohn (1894-1960)
Hodding Carter, Jr. (1907-1972)
Bern Keating (1915-2004)
Walker Percy (1916-1990)
Shelby Foote (1916-2005)
Charles Bell (1916-)
Ellen Douglas (1921-) | There are other notable writers preceding and following these eight, with new Greenville writers published nationally as recently as 2004 and 2005. Unknown others struggle for recognition today. And, as always, there are the readers – the force that ultimately maintains our literary heritage. mdm |
Greenville native Betsy Bradley was interviewd by The Clarion Ledger about her influential role in the arts in Mississippi. When asked about the roots of her interest in art, she replied that it began in her childhood...
|  The Time
Has come
and Ben Wasson
Ben Wasson (1899-1982) is notable not only in Greenville’s literary history, but among international scholars. Although a published novelist (The Devil Beats his Wife), he’s better known as William Faulkner’s first agent and editor. Ben’s memoir, Count No Count, recalls his personal and professional relationship with Faulkner from their college days at Ole Miss until the literary icon’s death, and is required reading for all Faulknerians.
At one time Ben was a New York book editor and a member of the Hollywood film industry, but poor health brought him home in the mid-1940's. Here, he produced his arts column "The Time Has Come" for Hodding Carter’s newspaper, The Delta Democrat Times. It was Ben who wrote, "Greenville – according to the editor of Atlantic magazine – had more published writers per capita than any place in the United States."
In 1946,Wasson, Carter and fellow Greenvillian Kenneth Haxton founded a publishing house, The Levee Press. Highly prized by book collectors today, the volumes produced included single short works by Eudora Welty, William Faulkner, W. A. Percy, and Shelby Foote are.
For decades, Ben Wasson was the Delta’s arts catalyst. Area artists and project directors could depend upon his journalistic support and/or personal encouragement. Shortly before Ben’s death, a grateful arts community celebrated his lifetime contributions with "The Time Has Come," a cultural festival and artists’ homecoming in downtown Greenville, named for Ben’s column. The organizers’ enthusiasm was the impetus for the Greenville Arts Council’s formation. Ben Wasson’s devotion to the arts is alive, today, in his hometown of Greenville.
SEE AN ARTICLE FROM THE NY TIMES ABOUT GREENVILLE'S "THE TIME HAS COME" CELEBRATION. CLICK HERE: LINK
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June 15, 2008
SUNDAY MORNING WITH —
Betsy Bradley, Director, Mississippi Museum of Art, 46, Jackson
Editorial writer: Jim Ewing
Photo: Brian Albert Broom/The Clarion-Ledger
Where did you grow up?I grew up in Greenville, where I was surrounded by indigenous culture and literary lions. The honoring of writers and artists in that town deeply influenced my belief that artists can be the moral cornerstones of our society. Although it sounds like a cliche to say it, my upbringing and my family relationships truly formed me. The Mississippi Delta has a deeply rooted sense of place. Although its history contains much darkness, it is also filled with light; and all those hues combine to make a deep impression on its residents. The river, the soil, the music, the words and, above all, the people give it an identity that defines its natives wherever they end up living. There is a poem called Home by William Alexander Percy, written during a brief period in which he lived in New York, that describes it best: it begins with, "I have a need of silence and of stars./Too much is said too loudly. I am dazed." Then it ends with "And then the summer stars ... I will go home." And he does. | Information sources for "Literary Greenville" and
"The Time Has Come & Ben Wasson" are works by the authors
and/or published interviews with the authors. "Literary Greenville" and "The Time Has Come & Ben Wasson"
is the property of McCormick Book Inn.
Before reproducing in any form, please secure permission
from McCormick Book Inn. |
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