The Modern Novel

Biography

Welty was born in Jackson, Mississippi in 1909 and, apart from a brief spell in New York, lived all her life there. She is best known for her short stories though she wrote novels as well. She was also an accomplished photographer and has published some of her photos. After William Faulkner, she is probably the most respected Southern writer.

As with any Southern writers, community, a sense of place, are important to her. She also shares with her fellow Southerners a fascination with the grotesque. She has a wonderful ear for the local language and oral tradition is important to her. Her work with the Works Progress Administration, which took her all over Mississippi, was very influential on her writing. Going right back to Robber Bridegroom, myth and legend have played a significant role in her work. She died in 2001.

Books about Eudora Welty

Paul Binding: The Still Moment: Eudora Welty: Portrait of a Writer
Albert J Devlin: Eudora Welty’s Chronicle: a Story of Mississippi Life
Neil David Isaacs: Eudora Welty (Southern writers series)
Ann Waldron: Eudora: A Writer’s Life (the latest but still very much unauthorised biography)
Louise Hutchings Westling: Eudora Welty
(Note that there is no good biography of Welty as she has resisted one. The best introduction to her is her own One Writer’s Beginnings. There are many more critical works. In particular, those with words like intertextuality and structure in the title or with a title that I do not understand, have been rigorously omitted.)

Other links

Eudora Welty
Eudora Welty
Eudora Welty
Eudora Welty
Happy birthday, Miss Welty
Featured Author: Eudora Welty
Eudora Welty’s work as a young writer: Taking pictures
Eudora Welty
The Eudora Welty Foundation
The Eudora Welty Review
The Eudora Welty Newsletter
Obituary
Interview
Interview
A Worn Path (story by Welty)
Place in Fiction (article by Welty)