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Thank you, Eudora Welty

Posted By Christopher Guerin On In books & writing | 1 Comment

I’m home sick today with the flu. Watching Woody Allen’s funny, but dated Bananas, I notice a laughing Eudora Welty’s brief cameo. She gets a big kick out of Woody sticking his cap in her face. Ah, Eudora. You saved my life.

Well, she certainly changed it.

In 1976, I was a finalist in a short story contest sponsored by Sigma Tau Delta, the national English Honors society. I assumed I had the inside track, because I was the only author with two published stories in the running. The award was to be announced at a literary conference in Oxford, Miss. Ms. Welty was the judge.

What a night. A nice meal with friends and teachers. Then Ms. Welty read a section from one of her novels (The Golden Apples, I think). Finally, the moment came. Yes, it was as silly as the Oscars, and when she read out a young woman’s name, not mine, it was crushing. I was as disappointed as Charlton Heston must have been for not winning for Ben Hur. (Oh, wait (quick Wiki), he did win. Well, he shouldn’t have.) As I recall, the story Ms. Welty selected was all rose dust and pigtails. I rationalized my loss by asserting that the winner had written a Welty knock-off. But, boy, could I have used the $1,000 award money!

To this day, I thank Ms. Eudora Welty. Seriously. I once almost sent her a thank-you note, but I decided she might think I was being sarcastic. You see, had I won, I’m sure that I would have gone on to a doctoral program and some writers workshop. I’d have ended up as a scholar gypsy for years, maybe, finally, landing a tenure track job in a community college. There was a time that I envied such a life, and I by no means knock it. It’s just that, in hindsight, it was so clearly not me. I left school the next year and eventually found myself in the symphony orchestra business. My first day on the job was one of the happiest of my life. 

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Christopher Guerin [4]

Christopher Guerin is the author of two books each of poetry and short fiction, a novel, and more than a dozen children’s books. If he hadn’t spent 26 years as an arts administrator, including 20 years as President of the Fort Wayne Philharmonic, perhaps he’d have worked a little harder getting them published. His consolation resides in his fiction and poems having been published in numerous small magazines, including Rosebud, AURA, Williams and Mary Review, Midwest Quarterly, Wittenberg Review, RE: Artes Liberales, DEROS, Wind, and Wind less Orchard. His blog, Zealotry of Guerin, features his fiction and poetry, including his sonnet sequence of poems after paintings, “Brushwork." He is the V.P. of Corporate Communications at Sweetwater Sound, Inc., the national music instrument retailer.
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