The Past Is Not Dead: Essays from the Southern Quarterly

by Douglas B. Chambers (Editor), Kenneth Watson (With), Peggy Whitman Prenshaw (Foreword by)

Overview

The very best essays from fifty years of scholarship and thought Essays by Margaret Walker Alexander, Alfred Bendixen, David C. Berry, Augustus M. Burns, James Taylor Carson, Thadious M. Davis, Susan V. Donaldson, Don H. Doyle, Barbara C. Ewell, Robert L. Hall, William H. Hatcher, Arthell Kelley, Manning Marable, Joseph Millichap, Willie Morris, John Solomon Otto, Harriet Pollack, Kathryn L. Seidel, John Ray Skates, Randy J. Sparks, Martha Swain, and Anne Bradford Warner The Past Is Not Dead is a collection of twenty literary and historical essays that will mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Southern Quarterly, one of the oldest scholarly journals (founded in 1962) dedicated to southern studies. Like its companion volume Personal Souths, this essay collection features the best work published in the journal. Essays represent every decade of the journal's history, from the 1960s to the 2000s. Topics range from historical essays on the Mississippi frontier, southern religion, African culinary influences, and New Deal politics, to literary essays on George W. Cable, James Dickey, William Faulkner, Eudora Welty, and Richard Wright. Important regional subjects like the Yazoo Basin and Mississippi blues are given special attention. Contributors range from such noted literary figures as Margaret Walker Alexander and Willie Morris, to literary critics Thadious M. Davis, Susan V. Donaldson, Kathryn L. Seidel, and Joseph Millichap, to scholars of African American studies such as Robert L. Hall and Manning Marable and historians including Don H. Doyle, Randy J. Sparks, and Martha Swain. Collectively, the essays in The Past Is Not Dead enrich and illuminate our understanding of southern history, literature, and culture, and celebrate the work of a distinctive, distinguished journal.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781617033032
Publisher:	University Press of Mississippi
Publication date:	07/01/2012
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Douglas B. Chambers is the former editor of the Southern Quarterly (2005-2011) and associate professor of history at the University of Southern Mississippi. He is the author of Murder at Montpelier: Igbo Africans in Virginia, published by University Press of Mississippi.


Kenneth Watson is the former associate editor of the Southern Quarterly (2005-2011) and associate professor of English at the University of Southern Mississippi.


Peggy Whitman Prenshaw is a former editor of the Southern Quarterly (1974-1991), Millsaps College Humanities Scholar-in-Residence, and Fred C. Frey Professor Emerita, Louisiana State University. And, she is the series editor of the Literary Conversations Series (from University Press of Mississippi).

Table of Contents

Foreword Peggy Whitman Prenshaw ix

Acknowledgments xiii

Introduction: The Southern Quarterly and Southern Studies The Voice of Humane Learning Douglas B. Chambers xv

Part I 1960s

Levee Building and the Settlement of the Yazoo Basin Arthell Kelley (1963) 3

From Enchantment to Disillusionment A Southern Editor Views the New Deal John Ray Skates (1967) 22

Some Mississippi Views of American Federalism, 1817-1900 William H. Hatcher (1967) 37

Part II 1970s

"Harmony with the Dead" James Dickeys Descent into the Underworld David C. Berry (1974) 61

Pat Harrison and the Social Security Act of 1935 Martha Swain (1976) 75

The Southern Belle as an Antebellum Ideal Kathryn L. Seidel (1977) 87

A Sense of Place and the Americanization of Mississippi Willie Morris (1979) 100

Part III 1980s

Cable's The Grandissimes

A Literary Pioneer Confronts the Southern Tradition Alfred Bendixen (1980) 113

Southern Writers

Notes Toward a Definition of Terms Thadious M. Davis (1981) 123

"Tough Times" Downhome Blues Recordings as Folk History John Solomon Otto Augustus M. Burns (1983) 129

The Black Faith of W. E. B. Du Bois Sociocultural and Political Dimensions of Black Religion Manning Marable (1985) 149

Subverting History Women, Narrative, and Patriarchy in Absalom, Absalom! Susan V. Donaldson (1988) 167

Part VI 1990s

On Welly's Use of Allusion

Expectations and Their Revision in "The Wide Net," The Robber Bridegroom, and "At The Landing." Harriet Pollack (1990) 183

Natchez and Richard Wright in Southern American Literature Margaret Walker Alexander (1991) 208

The Mississippi Frontier in Faulkner's Fiction and in Fact Don H. Doyle (1991) 212

Unlinking Race and Gender The Awakening as a Southern Novel Barbara C. Ewell (1999) 227

Part V 2000s

"When Is an Ocean not an Ocean?" Geographies of the Atlantic World James Taylor Carson (2006) 241

The Southern Way of Death The Meaning of Death in Antebellum White Evangelical Culture Randy J. Sparks (2006) 272

Africa and the American South Culinary Connections Robert L. Hall (2007) 291

Harriet Jacobs at Home in Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Anne Bradford Warner (2008) 324

James Agee, Walker Evans, and the Dialectic of Documentary Representation in Let Us Now Praise Famous Men Joseph Millichap (2010) 342

List of Contributors 361

Index 363