Omnivoracious, the Amazon Book Blog, has recently posted about Georgia writers as part of a series on the election and electoral votes.

The post has an impressive list of recommendations (though erroneously names the author of the Uncle Remus tales as Joel Chandler rather than Joel Chandler Harris.

Georgia has a rich literary history, as does much of the South.  When I was in undergrad, I took a course in Southern Literature, and it was a really excellent learning experience.

One or two suggestions I might add some of the following lesser known works to the list in the Omnivoriacious post:

• Augustus Baldwin Longstreet’s Georgia Scenes: my Southern Lit. professor wrote the introduction to the version I had in college
• Coleman Barks‘ Gourd Seed (poetry): my UGA poetry professor and a wonderful poet mostly known for translating the poetry of Rumi (in fact, the New Georgia Encyclopedia article recounts him sleeping through his last final exam — that was my class — he wrote a poem about us*
• Judith Ortiz Cofer’s The Line of the Sun

Check out some of the other Georgia authors in the New Georgia Encyclopedia.

* Here is a link to the poem.  He gave us all a copy of Gourd Seed, and I remember being so scared to ask him to sign it.  I worked up my nerve and brought it to the final exam, and then, well as the poem says, he didn’t come.  So, I mailed it to him with postage and asked that he sign it and send it back.  He did.  And he told me I would be a wonderful teacher with students who would be blessed to have me.