[Tyler discovered Welty’s “A Curtain of Green and Other Stories” at age 14.]

“I was just flabbergasted. I said, she’s writing my life, people I know, and it’s not Shakespearean English… Later I even got to know her. She was like her stories. There was something wondering about her as she spoke, as if she was marveling at everything she looked at.

“… I really think I’m deeply interested in endurance. I don’t think living is easy, even for those of us who aren’t scrounging. It’s hard to get through every day and say there’s a good reason to get up tomorrow. It just amazes me that people do it, and so cheerfully.”

(Quoted by Charles McGrath, “Attention Please: Anne Tyler Has Something to Say,” NYTimes)

(Copyright 2018 James Mansfield Nichols. All rights reserved.)