Most Influential Southern Novel

Academics from a few southern universities have compiled a short-list of “the greatest in Southern Literature” and will discuss/announce the “winner” this Wednesday night on South Carolina Education TV. There is also an “online poll” tab to click on so you can vote for your favorite.

The list of 20 titles that they compiled is:

  • Absalom! Absalom! by William Faulkner
  • All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren
  • The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman by Ernest J. Gaines
  • Beloved by Toni Morrison
  • Cane by Jean Toomer
  • The Clansman by Thomas Dixon, Jr.
  • The Color Purple by Alice Walker
  • Deliverance by James Dickey
  • Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
  • The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
  • Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
  • The Last Gentleman by Walker Percy
  • Look Homeward, Angel by Thomas Wolfe
  • Native Son by Richard Wright
  • Roots by Alex Haley
  • The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
  • Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
  • To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
  • Tobacco Road by Erskine Caldwell
  • Wise Blood by Flannery O’Connor

The blog where I first read about it says the show will be posted online, so I’ll share that as soon as it happens.

2 thoughts on “Most Influential Southern Novel”

  1. Just to let you know, the show will actually air on Wednesday, May 13 at 8 p.m.

    And Will Blog for Shoes will be happy to know that, with less than a week left in the voting, “Mockingbird” is the runaway favorite so far. It has almost twice as many votes as second place, “Gone with the Wind.”

    Thanks for sharing this, and letting folks know about the streaming version of the show.

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