Southern voices heard again in new book

William Ferris is bringing the voices of Southern writers, artists and thinkers together Thursday at Wilson Library.

Ferris will be sharing his latest book, “The Storied South: Voices of Writers and Artists,” in a discussion co-sponsored by The Southern Folklife Collection, UNC Friends of the Library and The Center for the Study of the American South.

Ferris, who is senior associate director for The Center for the Study of the American South, spent decades collecting interviews and narratives from some of the South’s most influential writers and artists, including Alice Walker, Cleanth Brooks, Bobby Rush and Ferris’ close acquaintance Eudora Welty.

“I feel close to all of them, but I knew Eudora the longest,” Ferris said.

“We first met when I was a child, and I visited her a number of times over the years and interviewed her repeatedly. Those interviews are collected into one narrative voice in her section.”

Welty won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1980.

Ferris said his work is a collection of interviews, photographs, DVDs and CDs of sound recordings with 26 different people and that he will be sharing these various media types at the discussion.

“They represent a diversity of black and white men and women, old and young, who share a common interest in the American South, and this book offers a very intimate relationship with each of them,” he said.

Steve Weiss, curator of The Southern Folklife Collection at Wilson Library, said Ferris’ work makes resounding connections with Southern studies and academics at UNC.

“The book is published by UNC Press, and the raw materials for Bill Ferris’ field work came from books in the Wilson Library that are under an archival collection in The Southern (Folklife) Collection under his name,” Weiss said.

“It showcases the work of one of our distinguished faculty,” he said.

Patrick Horn, associate director of The Center for the Study of the American South, said Ferris’ personal connections with his subjects provide a deeper understanding.

“He’s not just studying their lives and writing biographies on them,” Horn said.

“These are truly personal conversations that show a different side of people like C. Vann Woodward, who few of us know in that deeper sense, and (Ferris) provides us with these really personal connections.”

One purpose of the discussion is to examine Southern voices in the context of American history.

“I think people will really gain a sense of how connected the South is, even between places like Chapel Hill and Mississippi, but also between places in the South and out of the South,” Horn said.

“And that these connections transcend race, gender and other categories and boundaries that divide us.”

Ferris said in addition to the academic aspect of the discussion, he hopes attendees will view the night as a celebration of the South as well.

“It’s a subject close to so many people here at UNC, where the study of the South began over a century ago,” Ferris said.

“It has grown in dramatic ways over the years and we will be celebrating that legacy on Thursday.”

arts@dailytarheel.com