Fiction

February 29, 2012 The first words William Gay ever said to me occurred inside the public library in Nashville, at the annual Southern Festival of Books. I stood uneasily near the beer station—scared, really—and William sidled up and said, “Tommy Franklin says you’ll help me beat up ____,” a writer who’d reamed William’s fine novel Provinces of Night in a book review. I had just met Tom Franklin and didn’t recall ever saying I’d help anyone fight a critic, but I said, “Okay,” and started laughing.

February 29, 2012 William Gay was quiet, shy. He spoke in a whispery murmur that still carried that Old South weight in it. Almost a rasp, the singing the wind might use after a few belts of Jack Daniels. I asked him how he was. He told me he was scared to death.

February 29, 2012 William Gay’s work resonates with an Appalachian sensibility—the lament and yearning of fiercely independent characters, whether evil or innocent, who wrestle their environment as much as their history, or circumstance, or fate—rendered in his eloquent, speakerly storytelling.

February 29, 2012 On our road trips, we talk for hours and hours and hours. We miss our turns because the world inside the car forgets the world of streets and roads outside the car. On our way to Miami one time, driving east along the top of Florida on I-10, we looked up and saw the Atlantic Ocean outside the windshield.

February 29, 2012 After the reading, I invited William back to my house for a visit. He didn’t know me, but I mentioned that I had some beer and that I really liked Cormac McCarthy. These two facts seemed to do the trick. Back at my place, we passed through the kitchen, grabbed our beers, and headed toward the den. This proved an elusive destination for William because en route he had come across my bookcase.

February 29, 2012 I once asked William Gay what it was like to be a famous author in a small town like Hohenwald. Did his neighbors come around at odd hours, bug him for autographs? He said, “This woman asked if I had someone who helped me with my writing. I said, ‘What do you mean by that?’ And she said, ‘Well, I knew your family a long time, and they’re not that smart. I knew you when you were younger, and you’re not that smart. I was wondering if you had somebody who took out the little words and put in the big words.’”