Taking Literary License on Alabama's Literary Trail

by Marilyn Jones Stamps

During the Year of Alabama History, you are invited to follow the Alabama Literary Trail to the museums and hometowns of some of the nation's foremost writers, authors and storytellers. Plays, movies, tours and discussion panels held in various communities will explore the masterworks of Southern literature and honor their authors. For more information on specific events, visit www.southernliterarytrail.org or see the Alabama Calendar of Events at www.alabama.travel.

To Kill a Mockingbird, Monroeville
Like any journey, one needs a starting point, and what better place to begin a literary tour of the state than in Monroeville, the "Literary Capital of Alabama"? Novelist Harper Lee calls it home, and writer Truman Capote spent his childhood here. To Kill a Mockingbird is retold each spring in the historic Old Monroe County Courthouse, and the Alabama Writer's Symposium takes place each May on the campus of Alabama Southern Community College. The Old Courthouse Museum is located on the square at 31 N. Alabama Ave. 251-575-7433. www.tokillamockingbird.com

Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Montgomery
Follow the Literary Trail to Montgomery, home of the world-renowned Alabama Shakespeare Festival and its award-winning Southern Writers' Project, which celebrates the rich cultural heritage of the American storyteller and fosters plays that delve into Southern issues and the African-American experience. 800-841-4273. 1 Festival Dr. www.asf.net

Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald Museum, Montgomery
Located in a 1909 house in Montgomery's Old Cloverdale District, the Fitzgerald museum is the only one in the world dedicated to the memory of Scott and Zelda. Only the first floor—where Scott worked on his novel Tender Is the Night and Zelda began her only published novel, Save Me the Waltz—is open to the public. A 30-minute documentary about the couple's lives is available for viewing, along with photographs and other memorabilia. 919 Felder Ave. 334-264-4222. www.fitzgerald-museum.com

Come Home, It's Suppertime, Brundidge
When you "Come Home" to supper at Brundidge's historic We Piddle Around Theatre downtown, you are in for a treat. Alabama's Official Folklife Play and the winner of the 2008 Governor's Tourism Award, the play entertains you each spring and fall with toe-tapping music and a bushel of stories about ordinary people growing up in the Great Depression. Main St. 334-735-3125, 334-670-6302. www.piddle.org

Conecuh People…the Experience, Union Springs
Conecuh People…the Experience is a poignant story of a boy's coming of age in rural Alabama in the 1950s. Performed in the historic Red Door Theatre downtown, it portrays the life of Bullock County's own Dr. Wade Hall. In addition to the play, "the experience" includes tours of historic sites, quilt displays, art exhibits and dinner. Corner of Prairie St. & Blackmon Ave. 334-738-TOUR (8687). www.unionspringsalabama.com

Grits on the Side, Dothan
Dothan is home of the Understudy Dinner Theater and its award-winning play, Grits on the Side. Written by local writer, Ron Devane, and performed in a cabaret setting, the play is an original review featuring songs and skits about Southern stereotypes. 137 Oates St. 866-206-2337, 334-792-1268. 2563

The Miracle Worker, Tuscumbia
Playwright William Gibson was born in The Bronx, but the source of his most epic drama, The Miracle Worker, comes home to the northwest Alabama town of Tuscumbia. Celebrating over 30 years of outdoor performances as "Alabama's Official Outdoor Drama," the play is performed every summer on the grounds of Ivy Green, the birthplace of Helen Keller and the site of "the miracle" performed by her teacher Anne Sullivan. 300 W. North Commons. 256-383-4066. www.helenkellerbirthplace.org

Albert Murray and Ralph Ellison, Tuskegee
Albert Murray was born in Escambia County and educated at Tuskegee Institute, where he taught alongside Ralph Ellison. An African-American literary and jazz critic, novelist, and biographer, Murray is respected as the premier writer of blues music and personalities. Scholar and writer Ralph Ellison entered Tuskegee Institute on a music scholarship but was drawn to the literary genre. Ellison wrote several short stories in his lifetime, but only one novel, the critically acclaimed Invisible Man. Winner of the National Book Award in 1953, the novel addresses many of the social and intellectual issues facing antebellum African-American identity, including the relationship between this identity and the reformist policies of Booker T. Washington. 334-727-8347. www.tuskegee.edu

William Bradford "Bill" Huie, Hartselle
A journalist, editor, publisher, screenwriter, lecturer and novelist, William Bradford Huie was born in Hartselle and educated at the University of Alabama. His first novel, Mud on the Stars, chronicled the education of a north Alabama boy during the Depression and the events leading up to World War II. His name, however, would become forever associated with controversy when he wrote about the murder of a black teenager in Mississippi named Emmett Till for Look magazine. Two white men had been acquitted in the slaying. Huie felt that the truth behind the shocking murder would never be revealed unless it was told by a journalist. A crusader for civil rights, Huie was the author of more than 20 novels and works of nonfiction, many of which concerned violence and the Civil Rights Movement. William Bradford Huie Library, 152 Sparkman St. 256-773-9880.

Kathryn Tucker Windham Museum, Thomasville
Kathryn Tucker Windham was born in Thomasville but is a longtime resident of Selma. She was educated at Huntingdon College in Montgomery and wrote for The Birmingham News, The Alabama Journal and The Selma Times-Journal. She is known across America for her storytelling and is best known for her Jeffrey series of ghost stories. A museum name in Windham's honor, housed on the campus of Alabama Southern Community College in her hometown, takes visitors through the writer's early childhood, her career as a journalist and her rise to national attention as a storyteller. 334-636-9642, ext. 646. www.ascc.edu

Lillian Hellman and William Wyler, Demopolis
Before Lillian Hellman's Demopolis play, The Little Foxes, electrified Broadway in 1939, she was already an acclaimed playwright and Hollywood collaborator with William Wyler. Visitors can celebrate the works of these two great artists with remarkable family connections to 19th-century Alabama during the biennial Demopolis Pilgrimage sponsored by the Marengo County Historical Society. The pilgrimage features more than a dozen 19th- and early 20th- century sites, including Lyon Hall and Bluff Hall, inspirations for Lillian Hellman's Lionnet Plantation in The Little Foxes. The bank built by her great grandfather Isaac Marx will also be a part of the tour. Isaac Marx is considered the first Jewish settler in Demopolis. www.southernliterarytrail.org

Eugene Walter and William March, Mobile
An American screenwriter, poet, author, actor and editor, Eugene Walter was born and raised in Mobile. Over the course of his lifetime, he wrote several books and essays, including his evocative portrait of Mobile in 1929. By special resolution of the city of Mobile, he was buried in the city's historic Church Street Graveyard, where such notables as Joe Cain, Gen. Edmund P. Gaines and James Roper are also interred. William March, also born in Mobile, was a World War II veteran, short-story writer and novelist. March's writings characterized deep compassion and understanding and touched on such subjects as class, family conflict, sexuality and race. His novel, The Bad Seed, published in 1954, was a critical and commercial success, widely praised by for its use of suspense and horror. 800-5-MOBILE.

Literary buffs may also want to consider reading the works of Winston Groom, Clyde Bolton, Daniel Wallace, Fannie Flagg, Wayne Flynt, Virginia Van der Veer Hamilton and numerous other writers who were born in or have ties to Alabama. For additional information on literary programs, contact the Alabama Humanities Foundation at www.ahf.net, the Southern Literary Trail, www.southernliterarytrail.org, or the Alabama Writers Forum at www.writersforum.org.