| Walker Percy | |
| Born | May 28, 1916 Birmingham, Alabama, U.S. |
|---|---|
| Died | May 10, 1990 (aged 73) Covington, Louisiana, U.S. |
| Cause of death | Prostate cancer |
| Occupation | Author |
| Religious beliefs | Catholic |
| Spouse | Mary Bernice Townsend |
Walker Percy (May 28, 1916 – May 10, 1990) was an American Southern author whose interests included philosophy and semiotics. Events 585 BC - A Solar eclipse occurs as predicted by Greek philosopher and scientist Thales, while Alyattes is battling Year 1916 ( MCMXVI) was a Leap year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Leap year Birmingham (ˈbɝmɪŋhæm is the largest City in the US state of Alabama and is the County seat of Jefferson County. Alabama (formally the State of Alabama;) is a State located in the southern region of the United States of America. The United States of America —commonly referred to as the Events 1291 - Scottish Nobles recognize the authority of Edward I of England. Year 1990 ( MCMXC) was a Common year starting on Monday (link displays the 1990 Gregorian calendar) Covington is a city in and the Parish seat of St Tammany Parish, Louisiana, United States. The State of Louisiana ( or, État de Louisiane, pronounced) is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America The United States of America —commonly referred to as the Catholic is an Adjective derived from the Greek adjective '' / 'katholikos' meaning "whole" or "complete". Events 585 BC - A Solar eclipse occurs as predicted by Greek philosopher and scientist Thales, while Alyattes is battling Year 1916 ( MCMXVI) was a Leap year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Leap year Events 1291 - Scottish Nobles recognize the authority of Edward I of England. Year 1990 ( MCMXC) was a Common year starting on Monday (link displays the 1990 Gregorian calendar) Southern literature (sometimes called the literature of the American South) is defined as American literature about the Southern United States or by writers Philosophy is the study of general problems concerning matters such as existence knowledge truth beauty justice validity mind and language Semiotics, semiotic studies, or semiology is the study of sign processes (semiosis or signification and communication signs and Symbols both Percy is best known for his philosophical novels, the first of which, The Moviegoer, won the National Book Award for Fiction in 1962. The Moviegoer is a 1961 novel by Walker Percy. It won a National Book Award in 1962. The National Book Awards are among the most eminent literary prizes in the United States. Year 1962 ( MCMLXII) was a Common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1962 calendar of the Gregorian calendar. He devoted his literary life to the exploration of "the dislocation of man in the modern age,"[1] and his work exhibited a unique combination of existentialism, Southern sensibility, and deep Catholic faith.
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Biography
Percy was born in Birmingham, Alabama, into a distinguished Mississippi Protestant family whose past luminaries had included a U. Birmingham (ˈbɝmɪŋhæm is the largest City in the US state of Alabama and is the County seat of Jefferson County. S. Senator and a Civil War hero. Prior to Percy's birth, his grandfather had killed himself with a shotgun, setting a pattern of emotional struggle and tragic death that would haunt Percy throughout his life.
In 1929, Percy's father used a shotgun to commit suicide. The Percy family then moved to Athens, Georgia, where two years later, his mother died in a car crash when she drove off a country bridge and into a bayou—an accident that Percy regarded as another suicide. Athens-Clarke County is a unified city-county in Georgia, US, in the northeastern part of the state at the intersection of U [2] Walker and his two younger brothers, Phin and Roy, then moved to Greenville, Mississippi, where his bachelor uncle William Alexander Percy, lawyer, poet, and autobiographer, became their guardian and adopted them. Greenville is a city in Washington County, Mississippi, United States. William Alexander Percy ( May 14, 1885 – January 21, 1942) was a lawyer planter and poet from Greenville Mississippi. “Uncle Will” introduced Walker to many writers and poets and to a neighboring boy his own age – Shelby Foote, who became Walker’s life-long best friend. Shelby Dade Foote Jr ( November 17 1916 &ndash June 27 2005) was an American Novelist and a noted historian of the [3]
As young men, Walker and Shelby decided to pay their respects to William Faulkner by visiting him in Oxford, Mississippi. William Faulkner (born William Cuthbert Falkner) ( September 25, 1897 – July 6, 1962) was an American Author Oxford is a city and the County seat of Lafayette County, Mississippi, United States. However, when they finally drove up to his home, Percy was so in awe of the literary giant that he could not bring himself to talk to him. Later on, he recounted how he could only sit in the car and watch while Foote and Faulkner had a lively conversation on the porch.
Percy joined Foote at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was a brother in Sigma Alpha Epsilon, as was William Faulkner (University of Mississippi), and then trained as a medical doctor at Columbia University in New York City, receiving his medical degree in 1941. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill ( UNC, North Carolina, or simply Carolina) is a public, Coeducational Research Sigma Alpha Epsilon (also known as SΑΕ) is a secret letter social college fraternity A physician, medical practitioner or medical doctor who practices Medicine, and is concerned with maintaining or restoring human Health Columbia University is a private University in the United States and a member of the Ivy League. Year 1941 ( MCMXLI) was a Common year starting on Wednesday (the link will display 1941 calendar of the Gregorian calendar. After contracting TB from performing an autopsy while interning at Bellevue, Percy spent the next several years recuperating at the Trudeau Sanitorium in the Adirondack Mountains of New York. Tuberculosis (abbreviated as TB for tubercle bacillus or T u' b' erculosis Bacillus --> is a common Bellevue ( French, meaning beautiful view) can refer to Australia Bellevue Western Australia Bellevue Hill During this period Percy read the works of Danish existentialist writer, Søren Kierkegaard, and the Russian novelist, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and he began to question the ability of science to explain the basic mysteries of human existence. Søren Aabye Kierkegaard (ˈsœːɐn ˈkʰiɐ̯kəˌɡ̊ɒˀ in Danish Anglicized as;) Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky (Фёдор Миха́йлович Достое́вский, sometimes transliterated Dostoyevsky, Dostoievsky, During this time (ca. 1947) Percy converted to Catholicism, as well as deciding to become a writer rather than a physician--as he would later write, he would study the pathology of the soul rather than that of the body. Year 1947 ( MCMXLVII) was a Common year starting on Wednesday (link will display full 1947 calendar of the Gregorian calendar.
He married Mary Bernice Townsend, a medical technician, on November 7, 1946, and they raised their two daughters in Covington, Louisiana. Events 1492 - The Ensisheim Meteorite the oldest Meteorite with a known date of impact strikes the Earth around noon in a Wheat Year 1946 ( MCMXLVI) was a Common year starting on Tuesday (link will display full 1946 calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Covington is a city in and the Parish seat of St Tammany Parish, Louisiana, United States. Walker Percy died of prostate cancer in 1990 eighteen days before his 74th birthday. Year 1990 ( MCMXC) was a Common year starting on Monday (link displays the 1990 Gregorian calendar) He is buried on the grounds of St. Joseph's Abbey in St. Benedict, Louisiana.
Literary career
In 1962, Percy published his first novel, The Moviegoer, after many years of work and rewriting in collaboration with editor Stanley Kauffman. The Moviegoer is a 1961 novel by Walker Percy. It won a National Book Award in 1962. Percy later wrote of the novel that it was the story of "a young man who had all the advantages of a cultivated old-line southern family: a feel for science and art, a liking for girls, sports cars, and the ordinary things of the culture, but who nevertheless feels himself quite alienated from both worlds, the old South and the new America. "
Subsequent works included The Last Gentleman (1966), Love in the Ruins (1971), Lancelot (1977), The Second Coming (1980), and The Thanatos Syndrome in 1987. The Last Gentleman is a 1966 novel by Walker Percy. The story centers on the character of Williston Bibb Barret a man born in the Mississippi Delta The Second Coming is a novel by Walker Percy. It is a sequel to The Last Gentleman. The Thanatos Syndrome (1987 was Walker Percy 's last novel before his death Percy also published a number of non-fiction works exploring his interests in semiotics and Existentialism. Semiotics, semiotic studies, or semiology is the study of sign processes (semiosis or signification and communication signs and Symbols both Existentialism is a philosophical doctrine which posits that individuals create the meaning and essence of their lives and that this essence follows from their existence
Percy was instrumental in getting John Kennedy Toole's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel A Confederacy of Dunces published in 1980, over a decade after Toole's suicide. John Kennedy Toole ( December 17, 1937 &ndash March 26, 1969) was an American Novelist from New Orleans Louisiana The Pulitzer Prize, ˈpʊlɨtsɚ PULL-it-sər is an American award regarded as the highest national honor in Newspaper journalism, A Confederacy of Dunces is a Novel written by John Kennedy Toole, published in 1980, 11 years after the author's Suicide.
In 1987 Percy, along with 21 other noted authors, met in Chattanooga, TN to create the Fellowship of Southern Writers. The Fellowship of Southern Writers is a literary organization founded in 1987 in Chattanooga Tennessee by 21 Southern authors writers and other literary
The University of Notre Dame awarded Percy its 1989 Laetare Medal, which is bestowed annually to a Catholic "whose genius has ennobled the arts and sciences, illustrated the ideals of the Church, and enriched the heritage of humanity. The University of Notre Dame du Lac (or simply Notre Dame) (ˌnoʊtɚˈdeɪm is a private Roman Catholic Research university located in "[4]
The National Endowment for the Humanities chose him as the winner for the 1989 Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities, for which he read, “The Fateful Rift: The San Andreas Fault in the Modern Mind. The National Endowment for the Humanities ( NEH) is an independent federal agency of the United States established by the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities ”[5]
Works
Novels
- The Moviegoer. The Moviegoer is a 1961 novel by Walker Percy. It won a National Book Award in 1962. New York: Knopf, 1961, reprinted, Avon, 1980.
- The Last Gentleman. The Last Gentleman is a 1966 novel by Walker Percy. The story centers on the character of Williston Bibb Barret a man born in the Mississippi Delta New York: Farrar, Straus, 1966; reprinted, Avon, 1978.
- Love in the Ruins: The Adventures of a Bad Catholic at a Time Near the End of the World. New York: Farrar, Straus, 1971; reprinted, Avon, 1978.
- Lancelot. New York: Farrar, Straus, 1977.
- The Second Coming. The Second Coming is a novel by Walker Percy. It is a sequel to The Last Gentleman. New York: Farrar, Straus, 1980.
- The Thanatos Syndrome. The Thanatos Syndrome (1987 was Walker Percy 's last novel before his death New York: Farrar, Straus, 1987.
Nonfiction
- Bourbon. Winston-Salem, NC: Palaemon Press, 1982.
- The City of the Dead. Northridge, CA: Lord John Press, 1985.
- Conversations with Walker Percy. Lawson, Lewis A. , and Victor A. Kramer, eds. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1985.
- The Correspondence of Shelby Foote and Walker Percy. Tolson, Jay, ed. New York: Center for Documentary Studies, 1996.
- Diagnosing the Modern Malaise. New Orleans: Faust, 1985.
- Going Back to Georgia. Athens: University of Georgia, 1978.
- How to Be an American Novelist in Spite of Being Southern and Catholic. Lafayette: University of Southwestern Louisiana, 1984.
- Lost in the Cosmos: The Last Self-Help Book. Lost in the Cosmos by the late Walker Percy is a mock Self-help book and social Satire on the American value of autonomy published New York: Farrar, Straus, 1983.
- The Message in the Bottle: How Queer Man Is, How Queer Language Is, and What One Has to Do with the Other. The Message in the Bottle How Queer Man is How Queer Language is and What One Has to Do with the Other is a collection of essays on Semiotics written by Walker New York: Farrar, Straus, 1975.
- More Conversations with Walker Percy. Lawson, Lewis A. , and Victor A. Kramer, eds. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1993.
- Novel-Writing in an Apocalyptic Time. New Orleans: Faust Publishing Company, 1986.
- Questions They Never Asked Me. Northridge, CA: Lord John Press, 1979.
- Signposts in a Strange Land. Samway, Patrick, ed. New York: Farrar, Straus, 1991.
- State of the Novel: Dying Art or New Science. New Orleans: Faust Publishing Company, 1988.
- A Thief of Peirce: The Letters of Kenneth Laine Ketner and Walker Percy. Charles Sanders Peirce (pronounced purse) (September 10 1839 &ndash April 19 1914 was an American Logician mathematician, philosopher Samway, Patrick, ed. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1995.
See also
References
- ^ Kimball, Roger Existentialism, Semiotics and Iced Tea, Review of Conversations with Walker Percy New York Times, August 4, 1985, Accessed September 24, 2006
- ^ Samway, Patrick, Walker Percy: A Life. William Alexander Percy ( May 14, 1885 – January 21, 1942) was a lawyer planter and poet from Greenville Mississippi. (Loyola Press USA, 1999) p. 4
- ^ The Life You Save May Be Your Own: An American Pilgrimage, by Paul Elie, Copyright 2003, Farrar, Straus & Giroux
- ^ Notre Dame website
- ^ Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities National Endowment for the Humanities, Accessed September 24, 2006
Further reading
- Coles, Robert, Walker Percy: An American Search. Little, Brown & Co, 1979.
- Harwell, David Horace, Walker Percy Remembered: A Portrait in the Words of Those Who Knew Him. University of North Carolina Press, 2006.
- Samway, Patrick, Walker Percy: A Life. Loyola Press USA, 1999.
- Tolson, Jay, Pilgrim in the Ruins: A Life of Walker Percy. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1992.
- Wyatt-Brown, Bertram. House of Percy: Honor, Melancholy and Imagination in a Southern Family. Oxford University Press USA, 1996.
- _____. The Literary Percys: Family History, Gender & The Southern Imagination. Athens and London: University of Georgia Press, 1994.
External links
- Inventory of the Walker Percy Papers, circa 1910-1992, in the Southern Historical Collection, UNC-Chapel Hill
- Allen, William Rodney. The Southern Historical Collection is a repository of distinct archival collections at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill which document the culture and history The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill ( UNC, North Carolina, or simply Carolina) is a public, Coeducational Research Walker Percy: A Southern Wayfarer. (University Press of Mississippi, 1986)
- Bio at The Fellowship of Southern Writers
- The Walker Percy Project: An Internet Literary Center
- Walker Percy: From Pen to Print, a 2002 exhibit at the Rare Book Collection, UNC-Chapel Hill.
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| NAME | Percy, Walker |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | Southern philosophical novelist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 28, 1916 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Birmingham, Alabama, United States of America |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 10, 1990 |
| PLACE OF DEATH | Covington, Louisiana, United States of America |
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