Voices from the Quarters: The Fiction of Ernest J. Gaines (Southern Literary Studies) - Softcover

Mary Ellen Doyle (Author)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0807129100 ISBN 13: 9780807129104

Publisher: LSU Press, 2003

Synopsis

A Choice Outstanding Academic Title

"Who will write about the way my people talk, the way my people sing?" Mary Ellen Doyle gathers and makes audible the voices arising from all of Ernest J. Gaines's fiction to date--the indelible characters who inhabit the author's lifelong inspirational territory: the bayous, cane fields, and plantation homes of Louisiana's Pointe Coupee Parish. Beginning with the author's upbringing and influences on River Lake plantation--amid the pecan trees and live oaks, the big house and the tenant quarters -- this penetrating study offers close readings of Gaines's uncollected short fiction, the early collection Bloodline, and all of his novels, including The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman and the acclaimed A Lesson Before Dying.

Highlighting Gaines's skill at translating oral tales into meaningful fictional forms, Doyle advances an original theory of first-person narration ("camcorder") and traces its use throughout his work. Gaines's unwavering focus on the utterances of "his people" continually strengthens his artistic development--the voices of the early stories fusing with those of the later novels--until Gaines earns a unique magisterial "voice," an implied author who is black but speaks to universals.

Using critical methods as eclectic as the book's intended audience, and drawing from on-site research and interviews with Gaines's relatives and friends, Doyle offers a variety of perspectives on Gaines's fiction and its world that resonates so powerfully. Those who recognize Gaines as one of the finest southern writers of the last forty years will find here an accessible instrument to hear his voices more clearly than ever.

About this title

Review:

Doyle provides her readers with a privileged glimpse into an often inaccessible world, a world which Gaines says would have broken him had he remained on the plantation. Yet it is also the world about which, according to Doyle, he feels a sense of vocation, 'to be the last witness to [his people's] way of life before it passes.'--Louisiana History

Mary Ellen Doyle's study should quickly establish itself at the front rank of a growing body of scholarship about this durable southern African American writer whose works have been a persistent presence on the U.S. literary landscape for the past four decades. Drawing on both meticulous research and extensive conversations and interviews with Gaines's relatives and friends in River Lake Plantation, Louisiana, Doyle offers a lively and illuminating study of the scope of Gaines's work, from his previously unexamined short fiction through his popular novels--The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, A Gathering of Old Men, and A Lesson before Dying. Engaging and accessible . . . the most up-to-date contribution to Gaines scholarship.--Choice

Doyle traces the roots of [Ernest Gaines's] novels, fleshing out for us the rich bayou soil in which they grew. . . . Such careful scholarship as this elucidates the novels with the full force of revelation, for it sends us back to the novels as better readers. And is this not the true meaning of scholarship?--Louisville Courier-Journal

About the Author:

Mary Ellen Doyle is a member of the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth, and her previous publications on Ernest Gaines include interviews, essays, and an annotated bibliography. She has taught African American literature since 1967 and currently divides her time between writing, religious ministry, and teaching at Spalding University in Louisville, Kentucky.

About this edition

• Publisher: LSU Press
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0807129100
• ISBN 13: 9780807129104
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 250