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Mary Lee Settle

メアリー・リー・セトル

Mary Lee Settle

Profile

Gender
Female
Born
1918-07-29 （Charleston, West Virginia, U.S.）
Died
2005-09-27 （Ivy, Virginia, U.S.） age 87
Nationality
American
Languages
English
Residence History
United States (West Virginia, etc.) → England → Canada → Turkey

Career

Occupations
Writer, Novelist, Memoirist, Teacher
Active Years
1954-2005
Affiliations
Bard College (faculty), Iowa Writers' Workshop (faculty), University of Virginia (faculty)
Memberships
PEN/Faulkner Foundation (founder)
Influenced By
William Faulkner
Influenced
Contemporary American fiction writers (general)

Education

Sweet Briar College
Country: United States
Attended for two years; left to pursue acting and modeling in New York

Awards

National Book Award
1978
Work: Blood Tie
Organization: National Book Foundation
Result: Winner
Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize
1983
Work: The Killing Ground
Organization: University of Rochester (associated organization)
Result: Winner

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

Blood Tie

1977 Novel (expatriate fiction)

A novel set in Turkey that explores the relationships and conflicts among American and British expatriates.

Expatriate lifeCultural conflictFamily and ties

The Killing Ground

1982 Novel (part of the Beulah Quintet)

Considered the final volume of the Beulah Quintet, it deals with regional history and multi-generational family narratives.

Regional historyGenerational changeGuilt and redemption

O Beulah Land

1956 Historical epic novel

An early volume of the Beulah Quintet, covering development of people from 17th-century England in an epic historical narrative.

Migration and developmentContinuity of history

Bibliography

  • The Love Eaters (1954)
  • The Kiss of Kin (1955)
  • O Beulah Land (1956)
  • Know Nothing (1960)
  • Fight Night on a Sweet Saturday (1964)
  • The Clam Shell (1970)
  • Prisons (1973)
  • Blood Tie (1977)
  • The Scapegoat (1980)
  • The Killing Ground (1982)
  • Celebration (1986)
  • Charley Bland (1989)
  • Choices (1995)
  • I, Roger Williams: A Novel (2002)
  • Turkish Reflections: A Biography of Place (1991)
  • Addie: A Memoir (1998)
  • Spanish Recognitions: The Road from the Past (2004)
  • Learning to Fly: A Writer's Memoir (2007, posthumous/edited)

Style & Themes

Literary Style
Narrative, history-focused long-form fictionInterweaving regional and generational historiesRealist depiction
Recurring Motifs
Family tiesRegional history (Appalachia/South)Exile and expatriate lifeWar and social change

Health

  • Lung cancer
    2005
    Died in hospice care from lung cancer. Continued writing into late life but health declined in her final year.

Legacy

Known for the Beulah Quintet and winner of the 1978 National Book Award. Founder of the PEN/Faulkner Award in 1980, she made institutional contributions to American letters. Academically somewhat overlooked, she is valued for regional history and multi-generational narratives.

Archives

  • Emory University, Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library (Mary Lee Settle collection)

Quotes

  • Settle has gone so unnoticed by the academic community that the most recurrent subject among those few who have written about her is the fact that she has gone so unnoticed.
    Source: Brian C. Rosenberg, The Virginia Quarterly Review, Summer 1989 (1989)

Trivia

  • Reported to have tested for the role of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind.
  • Served in the British Women's Auxiliary Air Force and the Office of War Information during World War II.
  • Married three times; last husband William L. Tazewell died in 1998.
  • Founded the PEN/Faulkner Award in 1980.