Have you heard of Eudora Welty?
She seems to be a favorite writer for other writers to use as an example, with her quirky beliefs, spunk and spirit, and fascinating creative process.
At least, this is what I’ve seen of her. I have not read any of her work, but I have seen where she worked, read about how she worked, and seen many impressed by her works.
Here’s a dip of the toe into her sparkling style, from a job application cover letter sent to The New Yorker in 1933:
Gentlemen,
I suppose you’d be more interested in even a sleight-o’-hand trick than you’d be in an application for a position with your magazine, but as usual you can’t have the thing you want most.
I am 23 years old, six weeks on the loose in N.Y. However, I was a New Yorker for a whole year in 1930– 31 while attending advertising classes in Columbia’s School of Business. Actually I am a southerner, from Mississippi, the nation’s most backward state. Ramifications include Walter H. Page, who, unluckily for me, is no longer connected with Doubleday-Page, which is no longer Doubleday-Page, even. I have a B.A. (’ 29) from the University of Wisconsin, where I majored in English without a care in the world. For the last eighteen months I was languishing in my own office in a radio station in Jackson, Miss., writing continuities, dramas, mule feed advertisements, santa claus talks, and life insurance playlets; now I have given that up.
You can read more at the link above, and it looks like you should!
Southern writers seem to be The Thing these days… anyone have any favorites they’d like to share? Often they have fascinating life stories to go along with their unique fictional stories…
Image via College of Charleston Magazine
