Miss Eudora's Photographs

A long time ago, I read about and saw a couple of the photographs Eudora Welty did for the WPA. I was struck by them at the time, and put it on my list of "things to explore". It fell by the wayside somewhat, as many things on that list tend to do when faced with the awesome demands of time and funds that is day-to-day life. Still, the idea of them was hovering around my memory.

About a month ago, I got to attend a seminar on Welty's fiction at Millsaps. Part of the seminar included a tour of the library's collection of photos from Welty. They were amazing. I loved her composition and the way she captured the spirits of the people she was photographing. I resolved to go ahead and actually get one of the collections of her photographs and explore further. I came home, went to my trusty laptop and amazon.com, and sent for Photographs, the collection of her work.

Today was the first time I've had time to do more than cursorily glance through. I sat today and savored each one. It's amazing how she was able to record the positive. It would have been so easy in that time and place to find darkness, despair, resistance, and resentment. We're talking about the segregated, poverty-stricken South of the 30s. What she found, however, was the indomitable, the joyous, the quietly hopeful, and the noble in her subjects. She records the dignity and the regal humanity of even the poorest of them. Even if I had never read her stories, I would love her for that alone.

I wish I could have known her. There are numerous anecdotes about people just sort of wandering up to her Jackson home and talking to her. I would never have been bold enough to do that. It would have been an inexcusable intrusion into a person's privacy. I still wish I had been fortunate enough to have been introduced and had a reason to know her. Not that I could have come up with intelligent conversation, but I think she would have been a great person to visit with. She seemed to have that now hard-to-find Southern class that comes not so much from money, but more from the constant awareness of others and a general concern for them. It's a graciousness that is in sharp demand and short supply these days.

I'm currently pursuing a Rolleiflex on eBay. I don't know yet whether or not I'll be lucky enough to win it. I want to try my hand at seeing through that lens. I am sure my amateurish efforts will never have a tenth of the clarity and...magic...of hers, but I think just the act will be wonderful. I enjoy trying to see the world through my Nikon. Perhaps I can achieve that clarity she found and revive my view of the basic goodness of humanity through the viewfinder of the Rollei.