Newsletter of the
Society
Volume 9; May 2002
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Inside...Lynn Freed Awarded First KAP PrizeBibliography Porter Activities Katherine Anne Porter, J.F. Powers, and Katherine A. Powers ALA 2001 Play Based on Porter Performed in Austin Jiménez-Porter Writers' House at University of Maryland KAP House KAP School Other short articles
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Katherine Anne Porter, J.F. Powers, and Katherine A. Powersby Katherine A. PowersRepublished from the print edition of the KAP Society Newsletter May 2002 An excerpt: My parents, J. F. Powers (1917-1999) and Betty Wahl Powers (1924-1988) named their first child, me, after Katherine Anne Porter. I feel sure that they would not have done this if Katherine Anne's name had been different-though it's hard to think that it could have been. In any case, giving me her name provided a way for my father, in particular, to pay homage to a master of the short story and to express his gratitude for the support she had given him. Though they had corresponded for almost twenty years, the two writers did not meet in person until 1966. Their association began indirectly through Kerker Quinn, editor of Accent, the literary magazine which published Powers's first two stories, "He Don't Plant Cotton" and "Lions, Harts, and Leaping Does." Upon receiving the second submission, which, except for an inadequate ending, the editors thought far superior to the first, they forwarded it to Porter asking her opinion. She wrote back saying it would be good if the editors could get Powers to rework it; but even if he wouldn't, they should publish it anyway. Quinn returned the manuscript with a transcript of Porter's comments and Powers redid the story, and it remains one of his best and most famous. J. F. Powers was the author of two novels: Morte D'Urban (1962) and Wheat That Springeth Green (1988), and three collections of short stories: Prince of Darkness (1947), The Presence of Grace (1957), and Look How the Fish Live (1975). All are in print, published by New York Review Books, with the short stories bound in one volume as Collected Stories. Katherine A. Powers lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and writes a column about books for the Boston Globe. She is compiling a volume of her father's correspondence and would be pleased to hear of any letters from him that readers of this newsletter might know of. Her e-mail address is pow@world.std.com. |