Lee Smith

Linda J. Byrd Cook (Sam Houston State University)

Ed. by Emory Elliott, University of California, Riverside
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.4: American (US) Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary, 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Sofia Ahlberg (Uppsala University), Patrick Chura (University of Akron), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Christopher Hugh Gair (University of Glasgow), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Kerry Myler (Birmingham Newman University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Dates

Born 1 Nov 1944
Activity 1968-ongoing

Places

Born in United States
Active in United States

Activities

Primary

Novelist
Story-writer

Resources

Smith's Works

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A gifted fiction writer whose reputation has steadily grown for the past two decades, Lee Smith peoples her stories with real-life characters who struggle for meaning in their lives. Much of her fiction entails experimentation with narrative voice and structure. From the humorous and outrageous to the serious and epiphanic, Smith's work consistently probes the crises of identity that plague so many contemporary Americans, particularly women. Her female characters reflect the complexity and contradiction inherent in a Southern heritage and demonstrate Smith's vision of hope for the future.

Born November 1 1944, in the small coal-mining town of Grundy, Virginia, in the Southwest part of the state, Lee Smith was an only child and a voracious reader. Her father, Ernest Lee Smith, came from a

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3105 words

Citation: Byrd Cook, Linda J.. "Lee Smith". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 22 January 2003 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=4119, accessed 21 November 2024.]