Delta Wedding

Delta Wedding by Eudora Welty

In the heat of a Mississippi summer, the Fairchilds, a busy household of ten plus servants and extended family coming and going, are making preparations for the wedding of their daughter, Dabney. Visiting is 9 yr. old Laura McRaven, daughter of the recently deceased Annie Laurie Fairchild. She arrives by train, having traveled from Jackson by herself, and tries to fit into this boisterous family who all talk at once and seldom hear what anyone else is saying. They're kind, but not what we would call emotionally present. 

They seem a happy family, and think of themselves that way, but in occasional moments of solitude they question themselves and one another.  There is little time, or inclination really, for introspection and any doubt or sadness that rises is soon dismissed again in the busyness of everyday life. This quote says it all: "Now he was dancing, even a little drunk she believed - this was a time for celebration, or regret, not for talk, not ever for talk." This happy family, celebrating a happy occasion, left me sad. 

There were so many characters it took me a while to sort them out. There's the main Fairchild family, the father's brothers and sisters and their families, the servants, and a number of dead relatives who are referred to enough that you have to know where they fit. As I do with a lot of books now, I made a list to keep them straight and remind me how they were all related. Still, at the end I was left with questions. Why did daughter, Shelley, refer to her parents as both Mama & Papa and Aunt Ellen & Uncle Battle? Why is cousin Mary Denis' little girl called Lady Clare? And why is Aunt Jim Allen called Jim Allen? 

Most of the characters were interesting enough, though not terribly likeable. They seemed shallow people who thought mostly of themselves, with very few showing any evidence of a more thoughtful, inner life. Connections with each other were formed more from habit and history than from any deep feeling for one another, which I suspect is true of many families, even most. Cynical perhaps, but it's what I've seen; most of the deeply connected and loving families I've encountered are in books or on tv.  

But I digress. I enjoyed reading the first half of this book, then in the latter part I began to wish it would hurry up and come to an end. I grew tired of their easy dismissal of one another, but was also disappointed in myself for not getting more from the book. This is my first of Eudora Welty's and it came highly recommended as her best, so I'll attempt one more and try to do better.