South by Southwest: Katherine Anne Porter and the Burden of Texas History by Janis P. Stout (review)

Janis P. Stout has provided a closely focused and insightful study of the relationship between Katherine Anne Porter (1890–1980) and the Texas Southwest of her birth, upbringing, and artistic inspiration. That relationship was “uneasy,” given Porter’s longing for an idealized “southern” persona. The association is, according to Stout, complicated by the four main themes of Texas history, namely Texas’s violence, racism, marginalization of women, and geographical and border locale. Porter overcame in impressive fashion all the difficulties involved in this situation.

Stout is clearly on the side of those who see the major inspiration for Porter’s fiction as springing from the southwestern, not the southern, customs of Texas. The scholar defines her intentions succinctly in the preface: “My purpose … is not so much critical evaluation as exploration and interpretation of her life and works by way of her perception that being a Texan was a kind of burden to be carried.” Stout’s view is that this burden was pervasive in shaping Porter’s fiction and that she was able, in the use of that experience, to achieve a memorable literary legacy.

Katherine Anne Porter provided varied fictional treatments of Texas and the southwestern United States; such works are important documents in the historical and cultural study of these places. The Texas hill country, the rural area around San Antonio and Austin, for instance, where Porter was born and grew to maturity, provided an important impetus for the author’s creative work. Among the finely crafted works of short fiction that describe and analyze these areas are “He” (1927), “The Jilting of Granny Weatherall” (1929), “The Grave” (1935), “Noon Wine” (1936), “Old Mortality” (1938), and “Holiday” (1960).

Janis Stout is obviously familiar with Porter’s biography as well as the relevant secondary scholarship available. South by Southwest is a must for Porter scholars, especially those interested in Texas history and culture, and for general readers curious about the career of a major modernist author.