Series 24: Essays and Short Non-Fiction in Publications, Eudora Welty Collection (Z/0301)
Series 24: Essays and Short Non-Fiction in Publications.
Dates: 1933-1990; n.d.
Size: 0.67 cubic ft.
Note on arrangement and description:
This series consists of essays and short pieces of non-fiction by Welty in publications, and includes both original articles and photocopies. The essays below are arranged first by year, and when necessary within that arrangement, alphabetically. If the item was originally a photocopy, it is marked undated, with the date of the original provided in brackets: it is arranged by that date.
The original descriptions of essays in this series were those created by Welty scholar Suzanne Marrs for her work, The Welty Collection: A Guide to the Eudora Welty Manuscripts and Documents at the Mississippi Department of Archives and History (Jackson and London: University Press of Mississippi, 1988). The descriptions written by Marrs have undergone some revision. Several items, moreover, have been added to this series from the Welty Estate gift. These new additions are indicated in bold font. In describing them, the archivist has made particular use of information from Marrs’ descriptions; from Eudora Welty’s Occasions: Selected Writings. Edited by Pearl Amelia McHaney (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2009); and Noel Polk’s Eudora Welty: A Bibliography of her Work (Jackson & London: University Press of Mississippi, 1994).
In using this series, the researcher should be aware that there is other related material in the Eudora Welty Collection: Series 16 contains versions of essays used in The Eye of the Story; Series 19 contains Welty’s speeches, some of which were later published as essays; and Series 20 contains drafts and notes for Welty’s essays.
Special Note:
In 2011, a number of additional essays or pieces of non-fiction were transferred to this Collection from the Museum Division of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Some of these were original pieces from publications, and some were partial or complete photocopies of Welty’s articles. Since these too were part of the Estate gift, they are entered in bold font below, and will be differentiated from the essays received previously by a double asterisk **.
| Title and Description | Box | Folder |
|---|---|---|
| “Jackson Society Revels in Splendor Attached to Natchez Garden Ball.” 1933. 2 pieces. Memphis Commercial Appeal, 3 September 1933, sec. I:7. Reference photocopy [1-2]. | 102 | 1 |
| “Jackson Society Revels in Splendor Attached to Natchez Garden Ball.” 1933. 1 piece. Memphis Commercial Appeal, 3 September 1933, sec. I:7. Restricted original.** | 366 | 1 |
| "Women!! Make Turban in Own Home!" 1941. 1 item. Junior League Magazine, November 1941, 20-21, 62. Complete issue. | 102 | 2 |
| "Ida M'Toy." 1942. 1 item. Accent 2, no. 4 (Summer 1942): 214-22. Complete issue. | 102 | 3 |
| "Pageant of Birds." 1943. 1 item. The New Republic, 25 October 1943, 565-67. Complete issue. | 102 | 4 |
| "Pageant of Birds." 1943. 2 pieces. The New Republic, 25 Oct. 1943, 565-567. Two pages from The New Republic. Originally sent by Welty to John Robinson. | 102 | 5 |
| "José de Creeft." 1944. 1 item. Magazine of Art 37, no. 2 (February 1944): 43-46. Complete issue. Photographs of de Creeft’s work are on pages 42 and 47. | 102 | 6 |
| "José de Creeft." n.d. [1944]. 4 pieces. Magazine of Art 37, no. 2 (February 1944): 43-46. Photocopy, lacking photograph pages 42 and 47. With a few handwritten annotations. | 102 | 7 |
| "Some Notes on River Country." 1944. 1 item. Harper’s Bazaar, February 1944, 86-87, 150-56. Complete issue. | 102 | 8 |
| Letter "To the Editors." 1949. 3 pieces. The New Yorker. Department of Amplification. 1 January 1949, 50-51. Original pages cut out and glued to backing paper [1] Photocopy [2-3]. ** | 102 | 9 |
| "Is there a Reader in the House?" 1955. 1 piece. Jackson (Miss.) Daily News, 17 November 1955, sec. 2: 4. Reprinted under the headline "Eudora Welty Blames Lack of Reading for Lack of Creative Ability in Child." [Reference photocopy.] | 102 | 10 |
| "Place in Fiction." 1955. 2 items. The Archive 67, no. 4 (1955): 4-14. Two complete issues of a Duke University publication edited by Reynolds Price. The issues include three Welty photographs on pages 4, 8, and 12. | 102 | 11 |
| "Place in Fiction." 1956. 1 item. The South Atlantic Quarterly 55, no.1 (January 1956): 57-72. Complete issue. | 102 | 12 |
| "A salute from one of the family." 1956. 1 item. Lamar Life Insurance Company (Jackson, Miss). A Tower of Strength in the Deep South: 50th Anniversary, 1906-1956. Montgomery [Ala.]: The Paragon Press, [1956]. 3-5. Complete issue. | 102 | 13 |
| "A Sweet Devouring." 1957. 1 item. Mademoiselle, December 1957, pp. 49, 114-16. Complete issue. | 102 | 14 |
| "A Sweet Devouring." n.d. [1961]. 1 item. That Eager Zest, edited by Frances Walsh, 212-218. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1961. Photocopy. Final lines of the essay were typed onto essay and photocopied here; originally published in Mademoiselle, December 1957, 49, 114-16—see above. | 102 | 15 |
| "Henry Green: A Novelist of the Imagination." 1961. 1 item. Inscribed offprint from The Texas Quarterly Special Issue: Britain 2 (Autumn 1961): 246-256, originally sent by Welty to Mary Louise Aswell with a note dated Dec. 12 [1961]. See Series 29a. | 102 | 16 |
| "Henry Green: A Novelist of the Imagination." 1961. 2 items. Inscribed offprint from The Texas Quarterly Special Issue: Britain 2 (Autumn 1961): 246-256, originally sent by Welty to Alun Jones. With envelope. | 102 | 17 |
| "The Short Story." n.d. [1962]. 21 pieces. [Three Papers on Fiction.] Northampton, Mass: Smith College, 1962. 26-46. Photocopy. With cross-throughs and notations by Welty. | 102 | 18 |
| "And They All Lived Happily Ever After." 1963. 2 pieces. The New York Times Book Review, 10 November 1963, 3. With a cross-through in red pen [fragile original withdrawn, reference copy of front and verso available, 1-2]. Additional photocopy with photocopies of different handwritten notations [3]. ** | 102 | 19 |
| "Must the Novelist Crusade?" 1965. 1 item. The Atlantic Monthly, October 1965, 104-08. Complete issue. | 102 | 20 |
| "Must the Novelist Crusade?" 1965. 1 piece. The Atlantic Monthly, October 1965, 104. First page only.** | 102 | 21 |
| Untitled. [Tribute to Isak Dinesen]. n.d. [1965]. 2 pieces. Welty’s tribute appears in Isak Dinesen: A Memorial, edited by Clara Svendsen. 94-95. New York: Random House, 1965. Two photocopies, one page each. | 102 | 22 |
| "Words into Fiction." 1965. 1 item. Southern Review ns 1, no. 3 (July 1965): 543-53. Complete issue. Handwritten revision to essay; brackets around some passages, other passages marked for deletion. | 102 | 23 |
| "The Eye of the Story." 1965. 1 item. The Yale Review 55, no. 2 (Winter 1966): 265-74. Complete issue. | 102 | 24 |
| "English from the Inside." n.d. [1966]; 1989. 3 pieces. American Education 2 (February 1966): 18-19. Photocopy with letter from Mary Beth Craft dated November 9, 1989. | 102 | 25 |
| "Some Notes on Time in Fiction." 1973. 1 item. Offprint from The Mississippi Quarterly 26, no. 4 (Fall 1973): 483-492. Originally sent to Mary Louise Aswell. With inscription by Welty. | 102 | 26 |
| "The Feast Itself." n.d. [1974]. 2 pieces. The New York Times 5 December 1974: C47. Two photocopies. | 102 | 27 |
| “Letters to the Editor.” n.d. [1975] 1 piece. “The Surface of Earth.” NYTBR 20 July 1975: 24-25. Photocopy with copied handwritten publication information. Welty’s defense of Reynolds Price’s book is complete in the photocopy, but it cuts off the edge of one column of reviewer Richard Gilman’s reply. ** | 102 | 28 |
| “In Memorium.” n.d. [1975] 1 piece. Jackson The Clarion-Ledger Jackson Daily News 27 July 1975: sec. A : 1. Photocopy of Welty’s memorial tribute to Frank Hains appearing in Hains’s “On Stage” column.** | 102 | 29 |
| "The Point of the Story." n.d. [1978]. 2 pieces. NYTBR 5 March 1978: 3, 32-33. Photocopy. Pages 32-33 appear on one sheet. | 102 | 30 |
| "For Allen Tate." 1979. 1 item. The Quarterly Journal of the Library of Congress 36, no. 4 (Fall 1979): 354. Complete issue. | 102 | 31 |
| "Looking Back at the First Story." 1979. 2 items. The Georgia Review 33, no. 4 (1979): 751-55. Complete issue. This issue includes the text of "Death of a Traveling Salesman" as it was published in 1936 (pp. 756-69). With envelope. | 334 | 1 |
| “Mississippi has joined the world.” 1980. 2 pieces. The Capital Reporter (Jackson, Miss.), 24 January, 1980: 5 (in “Arts” section). Reference photocopy, copied on two pages. ** | 334 | 2 |
| “Mississippi has joined the world.” 1980. 2 pieces. The Capital Reporter (Jackson, Miss.), 24 January, 1980: 5 (in “Arts” section). Two originals. | 366 | 2 |
| “Finding the Connections.” n.d. [1984]. 6 pieces. Two photocopies of Welty’s tribute to Kenneth Millar (Ross Macdonald), published in Inward Journey: Ross Macdonald, edited by Ralph B. sipper, (Santa Barbara, California: Cordelia Editions, 1984), 154-158. ** | 334 | 3 |
| "In My Beginning Was the Word." n.d. [1985]. 4 pieces. Condensed from One Writer’s Beginnings for Reader’s Digest, September 1985, 94-97. Photocopy. | 334 | 4 |
| "And They All Lived Happily Ever After." n.d. [1988]. 3 pieces. The Complete Works of Eudora Welty, edited by Isuzu Tanabe, vol. VIII, [245]-250. Kyoto: Rinsen Book Co., 1988. Partial photocopy consisting of two copies of page 247 [1, 3], and a single-sheet copy of pages 248-249 [2]. ** | 334 | 5 |
| "Louis Rubin and the Making of Maps." n.d. [1989]. 8 pieces. [The Sewanee Review] 97 (April – June 1989): 253-260. The essay forms part of the Review’s section on "The State of Letters." Photocopy. | 334 | 6 |
| "My Introduction to Katherine Anne Porter." 1990. 2 items. A limited-edition offprint from The Georgia Review 44, nos. 1 & 2 (Spring/Summer 1990): 1-15. Copy number 17. A post-it note in Welty’s hand and the inscription indicate this offprint was intended for Danièle Pithavy. | 334 | 7 |
| "My Introduction to Katherine Anne Porter." 1990. 2 items. A limited-edition offprint from The Georgia Review 44, nos. 1 & 2 (Spring/Summer 1990): 1-15. Copy number 25. A post-it note and inscription in Welty’s hand indicate this offprint was intended for Hermione Lee. Welty’s signature appears on final page. | 334 | 8 |
| “Nash K. Burger Jr. of Jackson, Miss.” n.d. 1 piece. Incomplete photocopy (of the first page only) of a published version of Welty’s remarks in honor of Nash K. Burger, Jr. Her remarks were read at a party for Burger’s retirement from the New York Times Book Review (see also Series 19), and then published as an afterword in Burger’s autobiography The Road to West 43rd Street (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1995), 178-184. This photocopy, however, does not appear to have been made from the autobiography, as both the appearance and pagination of the photocopy (it is numbered page 2) are different from the version in the autobiography. ** | 334 | 9 |