Christmas Stories from Mississippi

by Tucker, Judy H.

• ISBN13: 9781578063819
• ISBN10: 1578063817
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-10-01
• Publisher: Univ Pr of Mississippi

Summary

How do you create Christmas spirit when the temperature refuses to dip below fifty degrees or when snow is a miracle that vanishes at sunrise?Held together by bonds of family, soil, and history, Mississippians share a peculiar yuletide experience in the Deep South. To capture the state's unique holiday glow,Christmas Stories from Mississippipackages writings by such greats as Eudora Welty, Willie Morris, Elizabeth Spencer, Clifton Taulbert, Barry Hannah, William Faulkner, and Ellen Gilchrist with the work of such rising stars as Edward Cohen, Carolyn Haines, and Caroline Langston.Illustrated by one of Mississippi's best known artists, Wyatt Waters, these seventeen short stories and essays reveal the wonders and sorrows of Christmastime and the special poignancy of childhood memories. With Waters's touch, the book makes the perfect gift for literary readers and anyone who relishes life in Mississippi.Christmas Stories from Mississippiopens with Welty's classic, "A Worn Path," and closes with Morris's personal reflection, "Christmases Gone, Revisited." Between the writings of these two Mississippi literary giants are stories, memoirs, essays, and excerpts such as Spencer's "Presents," Gilchrist's "Surviving the Holiday Season," an excerpt from Faulkner'sLight in August, Hannah's "Sermon with Meath," and Taulbert's "Quilts: Kiver for My Children."The many storytellers and many perspectives inChristmas Stories from Mississippishare Southern experiences in which families create their own entertainment, relish and break traditions, and celebrate a season in ways no other region's families can.Judy H. Tucker (Jackson, Mississippi) has published inMississippi Magazine, theClarion-Ledger, theNorthside Sun, andSouthern Living. Charline R. McCord (Clinton, Mississippi) is vice-president of publishing at DREAM, Inc., and has been published inThe Southern Quarterly,The Mississippi Quarterly, and theClarion-Ledger. Wyatt Waters lives in Clinton, Mississippi. Two books that feature his watercolors areAnother Coat of PaintandPainting Home.

Table of Contents

A Worn Path	3	(10)
Eudora Welty
From Light in August	13	(6)
William Faulkner
Clara's Star	19	(28)
Judy H. Tucker
Surviving the Holiday Season: One Woman's Crusade Against Christmas	47	(6)
Ellen Gilchrist
Finally, John Boy	53	(8)
Chris Gilmer
Christmas 1976	61	(12)
Caroline Langston
Quilts: Kiver for My Children	73	(6)
Clifton L. Taulbert
The Morning Stove	79	(8)
Nancy Isonhood
Sermon with Meath	87	(10)
Barry Hannah
Home for Christmas	97	(20)
Charline R. Mccord
Big Red	117	(8)
Jerry L. Bustin
Presents	125	(8)
Elizabeth Spencer
Land of the Giants	133	(14)
Carolyn Haines
From The Peddler's Grandson: Growing Up Jewish in Mississippi	147	(6)
Edward Cohen
Christmas Lights	153	(24)
Jacqueline Wheelock
Poets, Plumbers, and the Baby Jesus	177	(20)
Marion Barnwell
Christmases Gone Revisited	197	(8)
Willie Morris
Contributors	205