Literature

Stroll upon Faulkner’s native soil at his home in Oxford and learn about his family roots in New Albany and Ripley. See the Mississippi that Tennessee Williams called “the beauty spot of creation, a dark, wide spacious land that you can breathe in” by visiting his childhood home in Columbus. Visit Eudora Welty’s home and gardens in Jackson, which appear just as they were when she would step out the door for one of her countless trips to the neighborhood grocery store, which also remains. Explore the Smith-Robertson Museum in Jackson, where Richard Wright walked the halls as a schoolboy. These writers have given birth to a new generation of Mississippi literary heritage – from the master of legal thrillers, John Grisham, to the 2014 Pulitzer Prize winner Donna Tartt and Natasha Trethewey, Poet Laureate of the United States in 2012. If you love literature, Mississippi’s literary heritage and the native soil invite you to explore the inspiration behind some of the world’s greatest writing. Follow the Southern Literary Trail through Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia to visit the places that influenced well-known 20th century writers.

Eudora Welty

Eudora Welty House & Gardens

Jackson, MS

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Welty, born in 1909, was a writer of international acclaim. Her home is a National Historic Landmark and one of the most intact literaryhomes in the country. The garden is beautifully reconstructed to the1925-1945 period. House tours are guided only; […]

Rowan Oak

Rowan Oak

Oxford, MS

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Rowan Oak, also known as William Faulkner House, is William Faulkner’s former home in Oxford, Mississippi. It is a primitive Greek Revival house built in the 1840s by Robert Sheegog. Faulkner purchased the house when it was in disrepair in […]

Tennessee Williams Rectory Museum

Tennessee Williams Rectory Museum

Clarksdale, MS

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Between 1917 and 1932, young Tom “Tennessee” Williams lived with, and then regularly visited his grandparents in Clarksdale, Mississippi, where his grandfather Walter E. Dakin was rector of St. George’s Episcopal Church. The museum is housed in the four upstairs […]