Notes
1 Scholars debate the details of Marsdale’s biography, but a Google Books facsimile places her in Shreveport at the time of the story’s publication:
2 CitationPaul Elie concludes that critics must reassess O’Connor’s fiction in light of segregationist and racist views freely expressed in her letters. See “Everything That Rises: How Racist Was Flannery O’Connor?”, p. 85.
3 See Kristina Kay Robinson’s description of Mixed Company’s current “Republica” program, conceived “to bolster the radical imagination necessary to ensuring an equitable future for us all”: https://platformsfund.org/project/republica-writing-and-art-from-the-free-territory/Accessed 20 August 2020.
4 See CitationSmith’s “Remembering Katrina, Fifteen Years Later” for a discussion of the city’s economic obstructions, the result of long-term gatekeeping by state officials who profit from New Orleans’ arts culture but starve the city of appropriate funding.