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    The Land of Rowan Oak: An Exploration of Faulkner's Natural World
    The Land of Rowan Oak: An Exploration of Faulkner's Natural World
    The Land of Rowan Oak: An Exploration of Faulkner's Natural World
    Ebook161 pages47 minutes

    The Land of Rowan Oak: An Exploration of Faulkner's Natural World

    By Ed Croom and Donald M. Kartiganer

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    About this ebook

    The plants and landscape at Rowan Oak are the “little postage stamp of soil” that William Faulkner owned, walked, and tended for over thirty years during the writing of many of his short stories and novels. Faulkner saw and smelled the earth and listened to sounds from the cultivated grounds and the surrounding woods. This is the place that offered him refuge for writing and provided him food from its garden, fruit and nut trees, and pasture for his horses and a milk cow. Rowan Oak boasts a diverse landscape, encompassing an aristocratic eastern redcedar-lined drive and walk as well as hardy ornamental shrubs, trees, pastures, and a hardwood forest with virgin timber.

    More than fifty years after Faulkner's death, Rowan Oak remains a sanctuary and a place of mystery and beauty nestled in the midst of Oxford, Mississippi. The photographs in The Land of Rowan Oak are botanist Ed Croom's exploration and documentation of the changes in the plants and landscape over more than a decade. Croom encountered early morning mists, the summer heat and haze, and even rare snowfalls in his near-daily walks on the grounds. His photographs record a decaying fence line, trees and plants that have since disappeared, and the newly restored sunken garden.

    This book honors the land Faulkner loved. While Faulkner's novels have left an indelible legacy in southern and American letters, the landscape of his beloved home also serves as a record of the botanical history of this most storied corner of the American literary South.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUniversity Press of Mississippi
    Release dateAug 8, 2016
    ISBN9781496809025
    The Land of Rowan Oak: An Exploration of Faulkner's Natural World
    Author

    Ed Croom

    Ed Croom is a retired botanist from the University of Mississippi. His work has appeared in the books Herbal and Magical Medicine; Taxol: Science and Application; and Encyclopedia of Dietary Supplements as well as in plant science and chemical journals. His photography has been exhibited at the University of Mississippi and appeared in USA Today, the Scientist, and the Saturday Evening Post.

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      Book preview

      The Land of Rowan Oak - Ed Croom

      The Land of Rowan Oak

      An Exploration of Faulkner’s Natural World

      Ed Croom

      Afterword by Donald M. Kartiganer

      University Press of Mississippi Jackson

      www.upress.state.ms.us

      The publication of this book was made possible through the generous support of Evelyn and Michael Jefcoat.

      The University Press of Mississippi is a member of the Association of American University Presses.

      Copyright © 2016 by University Press of Mississippi

      Unless otherwise noted, photographs © copyright 2016 by Ed Croom

      All rights reserved

      Manufactured in Canada

      First printing 2016

      ∞

      Excerpt from The Mansion by William Faulkner, copyright © 1955, 1959 by William Faulkner. Used by permission of Random House, an imprint and division of Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved. Any third party use of this material, outside of this publication, is prohibited. Interested parties must apply directly to Penguin Random House LLC for permission.

      Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

      Names: Croom, Edward M., 1948– author. | Kartiganer, Donald M., 1937– writer of afterword.

      Title: The land of Rowan Oak : an exploration of Faulkner’s natural world / Ed Croom ; Afterword by Donald M. Kartiganer.

      Description: Jackson : University Press of Mississippi, 2016. | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Description based on print version record and CIP data provided by publisher; resource not viewed.

      Identifiers: LCCN 2016019882 (print) | LCCN 2016006712 (ebook) | ISBN 9781496809025 (epub single) | ISBN 9781496809032 (epub institutional) | ISBN 9781496809049 (pdf single) | ISBN 9781496809056 (pdf institutional) | ISBN 9781496809018 (hardcover : alk. paper)

      Subjects: LCSH: Faulkner, William, 1897–1962—Homes and haunts—Mississippi—Oxford—Pictorial works. | Rowan Oak (Oxford, Miss.)—Pictorial works. | Literary landmarks—Mississippi—Oxford—Pictorial works.

      Classification: LCC PS3511.A86 (print) | LCC PS3511.A86 Z7794 2016 (ebook) | DDC 813/.52—dc23

      LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016019882

      British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data available

      Preceding pages:

      Gravel Drive in Morning Mist, 2011

      House and Cedar-Lined Walk in Mist, 2003

      For Evelyn and Michael Jefcoat

      For your vision, passion, and support of this book

      and starting the restoration of the landscape of Rowan Oak.

      You are the living protectors of the spirit of this sacred place.

      Southern Magnolia Flower, 2004

      Contents

      ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

      INTRODUCTION

      PHOTOGRAPHS

      AFTERWORD: FAULKNER’S ROWAN OAK

      by Donald M. Kartiganer

      NOTES ON THE PHOTOGRAPHS

      BIBLIOGRAPHY

      INDEX OF PLANT NAMES

      MAP OF THE GROUNDS

      Acknowledgments

      Leila Salisbury, director, John Langston, art director, and Valerie Jones, project editor, are the key people at the University Press of Mississippi with whom I worked to create this book. They took some words and images and transformed them into the physical and magical object we call a book. Leila Salisbury was always bright-eyed and compassionate and totally enthusiastic that this would be a quality volume. As it was my first book, this was good to hear. John Langston and Todd Lape, as an experienced designer, took the images and made them sing the best song they could sing. Valerie Jones would check my quotes for accuracy and my words for clarity and was the strong, quiet force that gives you confidence that even if you slip up on something she will set it right. Valerie is the glue and binding and timekeeper that made this into a book.

      Bill Griffith, curator of Rowan Oak, and Robert Saarnio, the University of Mississippi Museum director, supported and encouraged my photography at Rowan Oak for these many years. Robert and Bill were the origin and supporters of my photographic images being exhibited as fine art at the University Museum. I hope this book serves as a tribute to their early encouragement of my photographs of the plants and land of Rowan Oak.

      Richard Howorth at Square Books encouraged the idea of these images one day residing on his bookshelves. Well, we will see what happens now.

      Deepest thanks to James Patterson for his critical advice in 2013 to personally do every step after taking the picture, from the image processing to the printing of archival quality photographs, to have the deepest knowledge and personal relationship with the image.

      Special thanks to Donald M. Kartiganer, Howry Professor of Faulkner Studies Emeritus, University of Mississippi, for writing the afterword on the importance of Rowan Oak and its land to Faulkner, describing how it served as a childhood haunt; a home for the love of

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