The literary world says goodbye to Reynolds Price, known by many as the voice of the south. Learn more about Price’s successful career by reading this New York Times article, and if you haven’t treated yourself to a Price read recently, try these:
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I pulled Kate Vaiden from my bookshelf and turned to the haunting letter from Dan that Kate discovers long years after her mother’s murder and father’s suicide. It reads in part: “Dear Duchess, We loved you. Remember that if things turn on me. I am hoping they don’t but Frances and I are in deep water and may not make it to land, still breathing. I thought I was all she had–me and you–but I know different now. When you get grown maybe you can understand … You can think you are somebody’s moon and stars and then wake up to find you are just who buys the groceries … Whatever I do next is mainly for you. I want you to have a clear road ahead.” I remembered a long ago moment in my own life listening to a recording of Reynolds Price reading those impossibly beautiful words. I was a very young English teacher, impressionable and wide-eyed, sitting in a banquet hall at my first convention desirous of conveying the power of words to my own students. Hearing his melodious voice moved me then — even as the memory of that experience moves me now. Gratitude and thanks to Reynolds Price for writing so many impossibly beautiful words.