From Texas to the World and Back: Essays on the Journeys of Katherine Anne Porter

265 Pages·2009·0.83 MB·English

by  Mark Busby

FROM
TEXAS TO
THE WORLD
AND BACK
Essays on theJourneys of
Katherine Anne Porter
Edited by
Mark Busby & Dick Heaberlin
FROM
TEXAS TO
THE WORLD
AND BACK

FROM
TEXAS TO
THE WORLD
AND BACK
Essays on the Journeys of
Katherine Anne Porter
Edited by
Mark Busby & Dick Heaberlin
TCU PRESS ■ FORT WORTH
Copyright © 2001 Center for the Study ofthe Southwest
Library ofCongress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
From texas to the world and back:essays on the journeys ofKatherine Anne
Porter / edited by Mark Busby and Dick Heaberlin.
p.cm.
“Sixteen essays first presented at a May 15,1998 conference ...at
Southwest Texas State University and held in San Marcos”—Introd.
Includes bibliographical references and index
ISBN )-87565-237-9 (alk.paper)
1.Porter,Katherine Anne,1890-1980 —Journeys—Congresses.
2.Authors,American—20th Century—Biography—Congresses.
3.Women and literature—Southern States —History—20th Century—
Congresses.I.Busby,Mark.II.Heaberlin,Dick.
PS3531.0752 z62 2001
813’.52—dc21
[B]
00-064863
Jacket: Black-and-white portraits ofKatherine Anne Porter taken in Notre Dame des Champs
apartment,Paris,between the Spring of1935 and the Winter of1935-36.Courtesy Papers of
Katherine Anne Porter,Special Collections,University ofMaryland ,College Park,Libraries.
Color photograph by Paul Porter.
Book and jacket design/Margie Adkins Graphic Design
To Linda and Andrea and to all future writers
from Texas and beyond who aspire to achieve the
skill and grace of Katherine Anne Porter.
v

Contents
Betsy Colquitt—Introduction ........................................................... ix
Don Graham—Katherine Anne Porter’s Journey
from Texas to the World ........................................................ 1
Janis P.Stout—Writing Home:Katherine Anne Porter,
Coming and Going ................................................................ 20
Darlene Harbour Unrue—Katherine Anne Porter’s Birthdays ........ 38
Jeraldine R.Kraver—Troubled Innocent Abroad:Katherine Anne
Porter’s Colonial Adventure .................................................. 54
James Ward Lee—Porter and Dobie:The Marriage from Hell ....... 66
Richard Holland—Katherine Anne Porter and the
University of Texas:A Map of Misunderstanding ................ 78
Larry Herold—Trapped by the Great White Searchlight:
Katherine Anne Porter and Marital Bliss .............................. 98
Roger Brooks—Hosting Miss Porter ................................................. 110
vii
Lou Rodenberger—The Prodigal Daughter Comes Home .............. 122
Mark Busby—Katherine Anne Porter and Texas:
Ambivalence Deep as the Bone ............................................. 133
Terrell F.Dixon—Knowing Nature in
Katherine Anne Porter’s Short Fiction .................................. 149
Bert Almon—Katherine Anne Porter and William Humphrey:
A Mentorship Reconsidered .................................................. 164
Rob Johnson—A “taste for the exotic”:Revolutionary Mexico
and the Short Stories of Katherine Anne Porter
and María Cristina Mena ........................................................ 178
Christine H.Hait—Gender and Creativity in
Katherine Anne Porter’s “The Princess” .............................. 199
Robert K.Miller—Cover-Ups:Katherine Anne Porter
and the Economics of Concealment ..................................... 213
Sylvia Grider—Memories That Never Were:
Katherine Anne Porter and the Family Saga ......................... 225
Contributors ..................................................................................... 239
Index ................................................................................................. 243
viii
Introduction
Betsy Colquitt
E
dited by Mark Busby and Dick Heaberlin,From Texas to the World and
Back: Katherine Anne Porter’s Journeyscollects sixteen essays first presented
at a May 15,1998,conference organized by Busby as director ofthe Center
for Study ofthe Southwest at Southwest Texas State University and held in
San Marcos.The conference celebrated both Porter’s life and works and the
recent acquisition by SWT and the Hays County Preservation Associates of
the house in Kyle,Texas,where Porter lived from age two until her early teens
when she left Texas to begin her journeys “to the world.”The refurbished
house, once the home of Porter’s paternal grandmother, will become a
museum named for the writer and used by SWT writing programs.
After Porter left the state as a young woman, she never again
resided in Texas and visited only rarely,but in her essay “Noon Wine:The
Sources,” she recalls her Texas past lyrically and also acknowledges her
Texas heritage as the primary source for her stories and novellas.As this
1956 essay notes,after leaving Texas,she spent “fourteen years in Mexico,
Bermuda,Spain,Germany,Switzerland,but,happiest and best,nearly five
years in Paris.”(The Collected Essays and Occasional Writings ofKatherine
Anne Porter, Delacorte,New York,1970,470).Her return to America in
1936 ended her “living abroad except for short visits back to Paris,
Brittany, Rome, Belgium” (469). But though she began writing “Noon
ix