Contemporary Fiction Writers of the South - by Joseph Flora & Robert Bain (Hardcover)

About the Book

The extraordinary flowering of Southern literary talent in the early twentieth century, the Southern Literary Renascence, has continued virtually unabated, showing increasing vitality in recent decades. These newer fiction writers, poets, dramatists, and journalists reflect in their work the changing social conditions of the South while also presenting traditional Southern values and qualities. Their astonishing output constitutes a phenomenon worthy of being called a Second Southern Literary Renascence. Joseph M. Flora and Robert Bain, editors of the acclaimed Fifty Southern Writers before 1900 and Fifty Southern Writers after 1900, found that they could only begin to suggest the continuing abundance and significance of Southern writing in the latter volume. Retaining the same format, they have developed two new volumes for the contemporary period. The first, focusing on fiction, comprises forty-nine talented novelists, including such popular figures as Pat Conroy, Gail Godwin, T. R. Pearson, Anne Tyler, and Alice Walker. The companion volume, (Contemporary Poets, Dramatists, Essayists, and Novelists: A Bio-Bibliographical Sourcebook forthcoming from Greenwood Press) will cover primarily poets, playwrights, and essayists as well as fiction writers who have made major contributions to these other genres.

The essays, written by scholars and critics, present in each case a biographical sketch, an analysis of the writer's style and major themes, an assessment of reviews and scholarship, a chronological list of works, and a bibliography of selected criticism. Considered individually and comparatively and with attention to the editors' introductory essay, these bio-bibliographical studies clearly demonstrate the state and strength of Southern letters.

Book Synopsis

The extraordinary flowering of Southern literary talent in the early twentieth century, the Southern Literary Renascence, has continued virtually unabated, showing increasing vitality in recent decades. These newer fiction writers, poets, dramatists, and journalists reflect in their work the changing social conditions of the South while also presenting traditional Southern values and qualities. Their astonishing output constitutes a phenomenon worthy of being called a Second Southern Literary Renascence. Joseph M. Flora and Robert Bain, editors of the acclaimed Fifty Southern Writers before 1900 and Fifty Southern Writers after 1900, found that they could only begin to suggest the continuing abundance and significance of Southern writing in the latter volume. Retaining the same format, they have developed two new volumes for the contemporary period. The first, focusing on fiction, comprises forty-nine talented novelists, including such popular figures as Pat Conroy, Gail Godwin, T. R. Pearson, Anne Tyler, and Alice Walker. The companion volume, (Contemporary Poets, Dramatists, Essayists, and Novelists: A Bio-Bibliographical Sourcebook forthcoming from Greenwood Press) will cover primarily poets, playwrights, and essayists as well as fiction writers who have made major contributions to these other genres.

The essays, written by scholars and critics, present in each case a biographical sketch, an analysis of the writer's style and major themes, an assessment of reviews and scholarship, a chronological list of works, and a bibliography of selected criticism. Considered individually and comparatively and with attention to the editors' introductory essay, these bio-bibliographical studies clearly demonstrate the state and strength of Southern letters.

Review Quotes

.,."provides a helpful resource for professionals, students, and popular readers."-Mississippi Quarterly

?...provides a helpful resource for professionals, students, and popular readers.?-Mississippi Quarterly

?A reliable resource, recommended for all academic and major public libraries.?-Reference Book Review

?The forty-seven contributors have created a reference worthy of its models, itself a model for its planned companion, Contemporary Poets, Dramatists, Essayists, and Novelists of the South.?-Wilson Library Bulletin

?The strengths of this compendium lie in its well-written and uniformly up-to-date essays and its composite picture of literary activity in the contemporary South. It will be a valuable resource for all libraries that support an interest in modern southern literature.?-Booklist

..."provides a helpful resource for professionals, students, and popular readers."-Mississippi Quarterly

"A reliable resource, recommended for all academic and major public libraries."-Reference Book Review

"The forty-seven contributors have created a reference worthy of its models, itself a model for its planned companion, Contemporary Poets, Dramatists, Essayists, and Novelists of the South."-Wilson Library Bulletin

"The strengths of this compendium lie in its well-written and uniformly up-to-date essays and its composite picture of literary activity in the contemporary South. It will be a valuable resource for all libraries that support an interest in modern southern literature."-Booklist

About the Author

JOSEPH M. FLORA is Professor of English at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. He is the author of literary studies of Vardis Fisher, William Ernest Henley, Frederick Manfred, and Ernest Hemingway and editor of The English Short Story, 1880-1945 (1985). With Robert Bain, he coedited Southern Writers: A Biographical Dictionary (1979) and Fifty Southern Writers before 1900 and Fifty Southern Writers after 1900 (both Greenwood Press, 1987).

ROBERT BAIN is Professor of English and Bowman and Gordon Gray Professor of Undergraduate Teaching (1987-90) at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. His books include two works on H. L. Davis, also The Writer and the Worlds of Words (1975), and The Cast of Consciousness (1987), with Beverly Taylor. With Joseph M. Flora, he was coeditor of the three reference books on Southern writers mentioned above.