Some of the greatest storytellers of our time chronicle twentieth-century southern life. Rich in irony, sly humor, and vivid, dramatic imagery, the literature of the modern South is a vital amalgam of a once-rural society’s storytelling tradition and the painful contradictions and cultural clashes brought about by rapid change. The stories in this collection are as diverse as the region itself, yet they are all connected by a shared history and a uniquely southern strain of American language and narrative. Contributors include Truman Capote, William Faulkner, Carson McCullers, Flannery O’Connor, Katherine Anne Porter, Alice Walker, Eudora Welty, and Tennessee Williams.