Still Driven by that Louisiana Thing: On the Thirtieth Anniversary of Callaloo 's 1978 Special Issue on Ernest J. Gaines

While preparing to leave from a recent visit I made with my colleague Marcia Gaudet to visit Ernest J. Gaines in his residence on False River in Oscar, LA, a place we know as La maison entre les champs et la rivière, Gaines surprised us when he pulled out a new story, "My Uncle and the Fat Lady," and asked if we had time to hear him read it. No matter what we might have had on our agendas back at the university in Lafayette, we told him we had all the time he needed. We had no idea that Ernie had been busy writing, especially after his long hiatus from his yet-to-be-completed The Man Who Whipped Children. After retiring from teaching and building a new house and settling it, finding the time to write seemed to be a more difficult task for Ernie than it had been in the past.

All of his published novels and stories had been written in San Francisco, even though they were all motivated by what he described to Charles Rowell in a 1978 Callaloo interview as "this Louisiana thing that drives me." Even the stories he wrote while in the service and for which one won a meaningful $15 in one Air Force contest and $10 in another were Louisiana stories. However, he was not in San Francisco anymore and was now living in the midst of the land and culture that he made famous to the rest of the world through his writing. Other things had happened in recent years that also had to affect his comfort level as a writer: he lost his long time editor, Dorothea Oppenheimer, after the publication of A Gathering of Old Men, and she was not only the person who placed and promoted his work, but someone who also served as his ideal reader; he also married for the first (and last) time to Dianne Saulney Gaines, a New Orleans native who was an attorney in Miami at the time they met and whose voice is prominently heard in the recent "Katrina" issue of Callaloo. In some ways, their marriage has brought aspects of his life and career as a writer full circle in that Gaines has said that his relationship with Dianne is the one he dreamed of when he wrote Catherine Carmier. Their relationship began during the last stages of his work on A Lesson Before Dying, and due to the widespread acclaim of that novel, Ernest J. Gaines, labeled "A New Star in the Canon" by the Chronicle of Higher Education, found himself in such demand by colleges and universities, civic groups, Oprah, HBO Productions, his students, his family, and even by entire municipalities in One City/One Book programs in Seattle, Miami, Rochester, Cincinnati, Lafayette, and many others, that it would take years before he would be able to find a few free moments where he might once again be able to write.

Other changes in his life helped to prevent him from having the kind of solitude from which he had benefited before he became a certified literary star. Once he became a married and settled man, he had to have a dog, and found himself with a rather demanding, although adorable one, DeeDee, and then a grandchild, Anna Lisa. On top of that, there were negotiations with architects, contractors, and builders because retirement required a house, not only for him but also for his wife, grandchild, dog, and frequent visitors. Then, not long after the house was designed, built, and finally settled, along came Katrina which caused no damage to the house, but the house, being a big house with wide opening doors, became a refuge and shelter for relatives and friends from all over South Louisiana who found themselves displaced by the storm. After the storm and after relatives and friends made their way back to their rebuilt homes or resettled in new places of their own, when there was once again only Ernie and Dianne, and grandchild...