First Friday; 2; Eudora Welty/French Legion Of Honor

The. The. The. The. The. The. The. The the. For. You're a. You not been privileged to participate in many memorable ceremonies in this historic chamber. Andrew Jackson Spokeo Mississippi CCD from the union here.

Our state constitution was drafted here a black man John R. Lynch presided over the House of Representatives here one hundred twenty five years ago. This is a place that perhaps more than any other in our state carries an aura of history and great events. The event which brings us here today rank ranks in significance with any of those historic accuse and of the past never before has the French Legion of Honor of that nation's highest civilian award been presented to Mississippi and here but never have we ever had a Eudora Welty. She has had the rare capacity to define with such eloquence and sensitivity those elements of the human spirit that link us all together in some wonderful and mysterious way.

Whether we be from Paris or Jackson or Tishomingo County Miss Wealthy it writes in the foreword to her to like full volume of photographs one time one place. What led her to begin. Writing stories she writes. But Away off one day up in Tishomingo County I knew this in a way that my wish. Indeed my continuing passion would be not to point the finger in judgment but to pocket Kirk and that invisible shadow that falls between people. The veil of indifference to each other's presence each other's One dog each of those human plight. Because of who she is and what she has written many of the barriers that have separated us have been lifted

and she has caused us to understand fundamental. Truths of our existence that we cannot be indifferent. To each other. And so today we recognize our common humanity as we join together in honoring this on common place. And now. It is my pleasure to present the distinguished lieutenant governor of the state of Mississippi. They all rot in Moscow got a maestro ATM. Thank you Governor. It's indeed a pleasure to be with you today on such a special occasion as we gather to honor you should or well to serve it is an honor for made to welcome outstayed wish visitors from France to Mississippi.

This well to set up a riding quote like a good many other riders. I am myself touched off place the place where I am and the place I know it is true place that we put out roots where these roots reach toward is the date running pain that fades and is faded but human understand like few others. Miss Welton's wrote Miss wealthy's writings are truly universal in application in her unique style. She is able to capture with accuracy and detail her Mississippi the seasons. The saw. The people. While you were visiting in this place. Our Mississippi. We sincerely hope that you too will be touched by that you too will find a sense of place here and a commonality with your home. We are pleased to be able to share with you our state our home and

our lovely. You should all well thank you. Atm. We are on in the state of Mississippi today to have several distinguished Yes from the Republic of France. I want to present the first of them to you now. She is Dr. Danielle PITA of the soup a professor of English at the University of Burgundy and Ishaan France. More important to us today is the fact that she is the founder and director of the Eudora Welty Center for the Study of North American women writers at the University of Bergen.

You know distinguished career as a teacher and writer. She has focused her interest on the writings of Miss well to. Participation leading to her doc Doctrove letters degree from the Sorbonne was a subject the death of Medusa. The technique in the work of Eudora Welty. In 1992 she organized the first ever national Eudora Welty conference outside the United States. That conference at the Bentley was style. The Southern Miss of Eudora Welty. In 1993 she presented the Medal of the University of Burgundy to Miss Welty here in Jackson. She has written and lectured in Europe. The United States and Canada own countless aspects of MS. Well this literary career she has appeared on the campuses of the University of Southern Mississippi and Millsaps College in recent years. Time

doesn't permit me this afternoon to recite in greater detail the full range of her work which includes literally hundreds of essays and articles and books. It is my president present to you now. Dr. Danielle Peter very soon look remotely. Thank you. Thank you very much Mr. Hoover for your very kind presentation. Miss Welty ladies and gentleman. I feel extremely honored and proud today to be in Jackson to present this Welty with the greetings and congratulations of the president of the University of burgundy of which you're a member of the whole intellectual community of France today. Friends is honoring your driveway was a prestigious militia and unknown which very few women have

received. Crazy down the whole approach by Catherine Bell she wished to confirm. They are major friends to a writer of universal import because he knew that the greatness of a nation is forged by its writers thinkers and artists. All great civilizations continue to inspire the world through the art that produced Eudora Welty is one of those universal writers who write for the present at all times to come. Certainly she has altered our way of you in the world. Wherever he leaves each of the readers feels personally concerned led to question the given invited to perceive and you have a core of the human mind with the created world for a spirit of challenge of pure exhilaration lifts. You draw what is fiction as she alters known modes of representation.

Generous powerful and splendid fiction reads like poetry. Yet each appeals to all reduce because it can be read at many levels. And that is the mark of all great writers. If my university the two hundred and seventy four years old University of Burgundy. If you don't have an honourary degree in 1993 the first outside the United States it is because of some deep affinities between the cells and Burgundy because of the confluence of two rematch nations lofty and exacting. Paradoxically aware of the extreme beauty of the sensuous world as well as of the digits is of the spiritual world with that very spirit of resistance that marks their histories here in Mississippi as in Burgundy to country's overall

culture shaped by Continue rich in tradition. It is the land that teaches time and opens the way to that hinterland celebrated by the French boy Eve going for quote that country of more refined essence where people are preoccupied with transcendence and with a place where it can be rooted. What. Then makes you do I will t so you knew. First she distanced a fiction from the dominant southern themes of history. Guilt painful racial issues. Instead she regarded that which all non-O to school form as content as the matter itself as Need Each puts it. She does when you read the problematics of writing about injustice prejudice extreme poverty southern violence is there. But it is to be found you know technique you know and less experimental with new narrative modes. That tends towards

obstructions. She was occurring in this contemporary trends in the ritual arts and inventing post modernism in this way. She liberated southern fiction from William Faulkner included I'm broke right. New paths that made it possible for younger Southern writers to write. Then the fiction is pretty and since it displays an infinite variety of mood stars and themes and this comes from a magnificent Barach imagination what you might call Southern Gothic or Southern protests you know work politics of that more universal mode of a re-engine life and the work of art something which privileges the singular and fleeting moment which presents life as dissolve into instance ever changing appearances and endless plays. On reflection the Baroque is also theatricality what

sees the spectacle stages it then loves that it inspires the magnificent comedy parody burlesque and musical spirit that pervades all when it is fiction. Finally like great women writers you draw a weighty as a cosmic view of life and the world. The characters are all simple ordinary people approach belong to our everyday experience. Yet beneath it all she sees that other dimension what she calls the holiness of life something that was strongly brought to her when she visited Europe in front of the capitals of the cathedral of Burgundy for instance she saw what she had been doing all along in a fiction that unique combination so characteristic of Romanesque art. Between the familiar and the spiritual that medieval tension between the

given experience and the revealed want transported her there was the power not the seeing itself but some tremendous force behind it that the coffer have believed in. Likewise in one writer's beginnings you draw away to rights it was later when I was able to travel farther that the presence of holiness and mystery seemed as far as my vision was able to see to descend into the windows of shop the still present figures in the capitals of autumn. Wherever I go and talk to writers from the United States Canada or Europe and South Africa they all say oh you don't I went to he's the best. She is the best because she's the most powerful. The fiction is lived on us pure and holy. And joining me now is faulty I have a

letter from the president of my university and I wish to perspective. Thanks. ATL May I present to you now. Another. Visitor from France without whose efforts we would probably not be here this afternoon. She is Miss Catherine parish screenwriter producer and director. She spearheaded the efforts of French citizens to on Miss Welty with a legion of on. Her credits in the film and literary world are so numerous that I

can't I began to mention all of them. Let me just give your side. She shot an edited film a film of interviews with a dozen major Southern writers of the United States for the film writers of the sile and that film was presented to universities in. Johnny Strasburg Paris and a special interest to us was that presentation at the University of burgundy as part of a presentation of an Honorary Doctor to miss Well she conceived then wrote a play personal collections on the history of women and fashion of the 20th century using film produced throughout the century. And that was presented in this country in Japan Hong Kong and Singapore and

in Paris as a result of meeting with Linda Gish. She wrote the other side of the movie states that the theatre of the best deal in nineteen eighty three. I could go on with our credits. I shall not take her time or yours it is my pleasure to present you now Miss Katherine their support role. T Thank you so much this is extremely. Ladies and gentlemen. I would like to express to share. A few moments of happiness that I have experience for 10 years already. In the winter of 1986 while living in Atlanta

I heard about Miss Welty reading her short stories in Birmingham Alabama. And I drove there and for the first time I heard you read. And the whole universe opened its doors to me. I had been fascinated by the culture here and the storytelling and of course the Righteous Among them Miss Welty and Mr. Walker Percy Walker Percy's here today and. It was totally amazed at the humor of the way Miss Welty read the stories and I was privileged enough a few months later to meet the month of September. Mr Walker Percy in Covington Louisiana and Welty in Jackson and while speaking to swell and hearing. The the thing which

struck me the most was extremely strong sense of humor. And I had already been very. Very happy to to hear the language the expressions here and especially appreciate it. So that's that became a sort of link between us and every time I visited Miss Welty Jackson. I miss wealthy with signing my books and I have one of which is 88 with best wishes and affection. And I appreciate your coming. So I mean this is for me the best memory I think. Also being myself born in a small city in the southwest of France. I Miss Welty helped me through Miss Walters work. I was able to

understand and like more the place where I was born to go. And my great grandparents planted many trees at the beginning of the century and all of them died except one the magnolia tree. And it's still here. As a child coming from Paris. The most pleasurable event was to be welcomed by by my grandparents and to have this bunch of Magnolia flowers and this magnolia tree is still strong and there in my mother's home. And now it's the Miss. Well it is St.. I think so. I. Want to. Being a European woman and thinking of Miss that in the the golden apples and the gold and the happiness of just been published in

France I would like to speak the last lines of tuna recites in French. An elder me missing for us only to have who led them at that piece of sooty fossil This is so for have and if the party have really upset the city of don't they you know in for some of it to shoo results cheated out of poor Miss Welty one month ago on Christmas day I called you to be sure Merry Christmas and you told me Catherine I'm so thrilled. But we are thrilled and thank you so much for giving us so much happiness. Thank you.

Forlorn. And now up to the climactic event of this afternoon the presentation of the Legion of Honor. We are honored by the presence here today of the consul general of the Republic of France the honorable Gerard Blanc show he has had a very outstanding career in the service of his country. After working in the private sector he entered the Ministry of Economy and from a finance and since that time he has served literally all over the world. It has been our privilege to work with him here in the state of Mississippi. I know that Katie has done Jim Hietala and others have have

very fine relations with him he's represented his country so well and he has been so instrumental in helping us arrange the ceremonies today it is my very great privilege to present to you now the consul general of France all of which are wrought bronchial for you. I'm available. Dear Miss Wealthy. Donna winter was a girl of distinguished guests. Dear friends from Mississippi and from France. First of all I want to extend to Miss Welty the warmest congratulations of our ambassador who as we know plans to stay in Washington because he's preparing for the state visit of our president to Washington to the United States at the end of this month. Otherwise you would have been here. This is definitely

a very intimidating ceremony for me. Not only am I standing in you know a building which concentrates the history and culture of the state of Mississippi but also I'm speaking in front of a very learned audience. But Miss Welty. This feeling of intimidation disappears when I'm speaking to you. I certainly feel hunted and moved. But I'm at ease and comfortable because of what I was reading on you and from you. To open one of your books is to branch into a warm overwhelming word and to be captivated by your exceptional southern separated. No wonder why as a perfect representative of a Mississippian literature and joy de France for more than 60 years I

think your works have been unanimously praised and the latest proof is the publishing of the golden apples. Just two months ago in France France as a whole always had the ambition some say had rock bands that do not listen to them. To have an eye. On the worse culture. So the government of France could not ignore Eudora Welty and wants to welcome her among the recipients of the Legion of Honor. And I know that one of the first character that Miss Welty stage in their stories was a certain Mr boor was French but he was a vicious murderer. But. We will. Forget. So. Miss Welty will be

welcoming this legion of our No. And she's a writer who by a single talent from the first time observation. I think you need region here. The South has raised herself to an international level or level of recognition. Emperor Napoleon the first who created the Legion of Honor in 18 all too long before this building was erected. Which is now the oldest French award it would have been proud to see how the tradition respect are treated. So. My country is greatly honored Miss Welty to present you with the middle of night of the Legion of Honor. Let me proceed now with a formal ceremony and I will have to say a few words in France in French as you know this

has to be made in French. A. There you know how we all know you're crazy. Don't ridicule. You shouldn't be provided you don't go. I guess you're not doing anything with the net. Or.

Were. You. I. Will respond adequately to what has just been said and done of late. I'm so. Happy and honored and thank you I'm so proud to be in this group of people who love the written word that big and so I feel very happy and grateful

to everybody here and to Bryant. Well all my love. Thank you. Thank you Arwa.