December 31, 1996
CONTACT:
Jean Kempe-Ware, director of public relations, Lewis & Clark College, (503) 768-7963, [email protected]
Book features Ralph Ellison's previously unpublished work
PORTLAND, Ore.--John F. Callahan, the Morgan S. Odell Professor of Humanities at Lewis & Clark College, has published Flying Home and Other Stories, a collection of 13 short stories by Ralph Ellison.
Ralph Ellison, who died in 1994, is the author of Invisible Man, which won the National Book Award and became one of the most significant postwar American novels. Callahan, Ellison's literary executor, collected and edited the stories, six of which were never published in Ellison's lifetime.
The collection began when Callahan discovered "a brown imitation-leather folder with RALPH W. ELLISON embossed in gold letters on the front. Inside, bulging with manuscripts, was a manila folder labeled "Early Stories," according to the introduction.
"I realized these were stories that had never been published, never been mentioned--stories no one knew about. To my surprise I found that even Mrs. Ellison didn't know about them.
"Discovery of the half dozen early stories made it possible to put together a volume of Ellison's best published and unpublished freestanding fiction," according to Callahan.
"These stories are early exploration of his lifelong fascination with the complex fate and beautiful absurdity of American identity. In them, a young writer finds his voice and sets about mastering his craft."
Callahan's books include The Illusions of a Nation and In the African-American Grain: Call-and-Response. He is the editor of the Modern Library edition of The Collected Essays of Ralph Ellison. Callahan has taught at Lewis & Clark since 1967 and was a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, D.C., during 1995-96. ###
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