Many historic writers got their start in Georgia, including James Dickey, who is most noted for his book, Deliverance; Flannery O'Conner, who wrote Wise Blood and The Violent Bear it Away; and Alice Walker, who won the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award for The Color Purple. Georgia native Margaret Mitchell was responsible for providing the basis of the most iconic Hollywood film of all time, Gone With the Wind.
Early Georgia Literature Not Literature at All
What most people consider to be early Georgian literature is really an amalgamation of letters, diaries, journals, political speeches, and newspaper articles written by professionals and the citizens of the state. These writings were important in preserving the early history of Georgia and the lifestyle of its citizens.
Getting Started
Georgia is the birthplace of a form of writing called Frontier Writing. Frontier Writing was a style of writing that vividly described life on the frontier. Most of these works were short sketches that were narrated by someone in the room who would read the work with condescension, describing the daily activities of those who lived on the frontier. These written works were generally authored by educated men, doctors, and lawyers. One of the most famous Frontier Writers was Augustus Baldwin Longstreet, who in 1835 published a collection of his works. While his work was noted for its crude humor, it was more noted for its brutality and explicit depictions of violence.
Georgia Literature Becomes More Sophisticated
At the beginning of the 20th Century, Georgian writers began to turn to fiction to illustrate the more serious themes of Georgia life. Writer Conrad Aiken led this movement. A native of Savannah, Aiken was educated at Harvard and was roommates with the famous poet T.S. Eliot. During his career Aiken produced highly praised poetry and fiction. While the themes of his works had a more serious tone than past Georgian literature, he failed to truly capture many of the important issues concerning his home state, such as race and religion.
It was writers like Margaret Mitchell, Erskine Caldwell, and Flannery O'Conner, who wrote fiction that centered more on the issues facing Georgia. The biggest issue around this time was race, which is a theme prevalent in many of the works by these talented writers. Many African-American authors also took up pen and paper to write stories focusing on the slow progress of racial equality in cities such as Atlanta. With influence and help from writer and social reformer W.E.B. DuBois, African-American writers left their mark on Georgia society. DuBois himself, taught at Atlanta University for thirteen years during this period. While living in Georgia he wrote the book, The Souls of Black Folk, which today still remains one of the most important commentaries on race and racism in America.
Modern Georgian Literature
As the Civil Rights Movement was becoming very volatile, four socially conscious authors came to the forefront. Among them, Flannery O'Conner is best remembered. Her use of the grotesque, comedy, and tragedy within her novels painted a landscape of a modern world on the verge of collapse. O'Conner took the issues confronting Georgia during her life and applied them to humanity overall, and her works are still highly respected today.
Behind O'Conner came James Dickey, who dominated the literary landscape of Georgia from the 1950 to 1970s. The most prominent theme throughout James Dickey's works is the idea of gaining redemption through action. His novel, Deliverance, stands as a shining example of this theme, as well as his last novel, To the White Sea, which was published in 1993, four years before his death.
After O'Conner and Dickey came Alice Walker and Harry Crews. Walker is most famous for her novel, The Color Purple. The focus of her work centers on black women struggling to find their place in both white and black society. Crews draws on the style of Flannery O'Conner, preferring to develop characters of insignificance in society, such as paraplegic wrestlers and female bodybuilders. Crews is considered to be one of the last great Georgian writers of the 20th Century.
The Future of Georgia Literature
Though many of the authors who helped found Georgian literature are gone, there are modern-day fiction writers who are now bearing the torch. For example, David Bottoms is Georgia's poet laureate, and has been the leading poet in Georgia for thirty years. He is joined by talented poets like Edgar Bowers, Charlie Smith, and Judith Ortiz Cofer. As for fiction, Pat Conroy stands out on his own, and is best know for his book, The Prince of Tides, which he also wrote the screenplay for in 1991.
The works of Georgia's authors depict themes like family, war, hardship, love, and death in an expert fashion, and have solidified the state as one of the literary world's most talented pools of writers, a trend which shows no sign of slowing down anytime soon.
