Becoming Southern Writers

"We need more volumes like this one. Reading it leaves one feeling grateful for the life choices these writers and scholars made, and hopeful for the future of our academic profession."—The Journal of Southern History

"What a treasure trove! It's not enough that Charles Joyner has made his own significant contribution to Southern history and literature; here a collection of renowned writers honoring him as their friend, and in many cases mentor, adds to his legacy through essays and mini-histories sure to grab any reader with even a touch of southern blood or experience. Josephine Humphrey's musing that the South is a little like her mother, 'full of secrets I would never know and truths I would not hear in full,' sums up what so many of us children of Dixie feel. Many of those secrets and truths can be found in these pages."—Cokie Roberts, journalist and author of Capital Dames: The Civil War and the Women of Washington

"This array of essays and artistic creations by historians, folklorists, poets, writers all, is a special constellation in the Southern sky, all shining and especially singing to the brightest star among them—Charles Joyner. It is as if someone held a huge lowcountry fish fry and picnic full of storytelling, inspiring and tragic ideas, poetry, music, psalm-readings, laughs, and tears. And everybody learned something new, felt something special, and said 'Amen.' Joyner deserves this intellectual and affectionate tribute for his unparalleled scholarship and imagination in telling us about the South, our cultures, our nation and ourselves."—David W. Blight, Yale University, author of Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory

"This remarkable collection of essays constitutes a unique collective intellectual autobiography of this generation's leading scholars of the American South. But the essays' interdisciplinary richness also testifies to Chaz Joyner's path-breaking scholarship and his unequalled capacity for collegial friendship and support, both personal and academic."—Tony Badger, Emeritus Paul Mellon Professor, Cambridge University and Emeritus Master, Clare College

"Charles Joyner has long been an exemplary southern man of letters and these fascinating accounts of how some two dozen writers became southern writers do him great, and deserved, honor."—Shane White, author of Prince of Darkness: The Untold Story of Jeremiah G. Hamilton, Wall Street's First Black Millionaire