Southern Literature in Transition: Heritage and Promise ed. by Philip Castille and William Osborne (review)

140Book Reviews religion and literature. Atkins' analysis ofthis "theology connection" brings to the attention of the literary scholar a growing body of work whose goal is to examine the importance of deconstruction for Biblical studies, and to develop a "deconstructive theology." Atkins' book thus brings to light an aspect of deconstruction that is not dealt with in the other general studies ofthe subject. The second part of Atkins' book is a one-chapter pivot whose intent is to move from reading deconstruction to deconstructive reading through the analysis of a deconstructive text by Vincent Leitch which, in essence, accuses J. Hillis Miller of not being fully deconstructive. Criticizing Leitch for remaining within hierarchical modes of thought by opposing theory to practice , Atkins sees Leitch's text as undoing its own declared choices and intentions . But, Atkins asserts, this situation is always present to some degree in any text, and can never be fully corrected, no matter how rigorous and careful one tries to be. Atkins' own kinds of critical lapsus — at one point he refers to Derrida as the "father of deconstruction" (65) — attest to the impossibility of complete vigilance in respect to language's capacity for betraying one's declared intentions, for perpetrating the kind of hierarchical, genealogical thinking one overtly seeks to dismantle. Indeed, Atkins speaks throughout his text of "undoing/preserving" as a gesture basic to deconstructive thought. The third and final section of Atkins' study proposes deconstructive readings of three Augustan texts: Dryden's Religio Laid, Swift's Tale ofa Tub, and Pope's Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot. Here, Atkins examines Augustan literature's little-studied interest in questions of reading, interpretation, and interpretive authority. Lucid and clearly argued, these essays exemplify the both/and and undoing/preserving qualities that Atkins sees as fundamental to deconstructive reading. Thus, while Atkins' volume may lack the scope and detail of more exhaustive , more "advanced" introductions to deconstruction, it nevertheless pursues the question of deconstruction's implications for two areas — theology and Augustan literature — which have to date received relatively little attention by literary scholars. CECILE LINDSAY University of Nevada, Reno PHILIP CASTILLE AND WILLIAM OSBORNE, eds. Southern Literature in Transition: Heritage and Promise. Memphis: Memphis State University Press, 1983. 149 p. At first glance, this collection ofpapers from a 1980 Memphis State Symposium looks traditional indeed: the introduction begins with the requisite Faulknerean quote on the importance of place, and the list of contributors includes such venerable names in Southern literary criticism as Cleanth Brooks, Thomas McHaney, and Lewis P. Simpson. The opening essay by C. Hugh Holman (himself a dean of Southern literary criticism) is, then, both a surprise and a delight. In "No More Monoliths, Please: Continuities in the Multi-South," Holman argues against the "common human tendency to seek the controlling unity" which has led critics to shape Southern literature to a variety of Procrustian beds, and in favor of incorporating insights offered by Book Reviews141 such new critical approaches as those of the structuralists, the feminists, and the students of black culture. He also suggests expanding the canon of Southern literature to include more works by blacks and women, as well as such "non-literary" works as Hinton R. Helper's The Impending Crisis and Thomas Dixon, Jr.'s propaganda (the novels and The Birth of a Nation film). Unfortunately, the rest of this collection does not live up to the vigor promised by Holman's fresh approach. Essays in the first half take a broad overview of the field; those in the second examine particular authors. In neither section are there many surprises. The old fear that the New South will eradicate the Old is reaffirmed. The traditional debate about regionalism, provincialism, and universality is renewed. The standard writers — Faulkner , Welty, Ransom, Chopin, O'Connor, both Percys — are examined in essay after essay. (Outside of Holman's essay there is no mention of Ralph Ellison, Ernest Gaines, Richard Wright, Tennessee Williams, Reynolds Price, Mary Chesnut, or Lillian Hellman; there is no mention anywhere of Alice Walker or Anne Tyler.) Most of the critics are white and male. Finally, the collection serves largely to entrench "The Southern Literary Pieties" which Noel Polk ostensibly attacks...