Writer Ron Rash’s archive finds new home at University of South Carolina

The personal archive of international best-selling writer and South Carolina native Ron Rash has found a new home at the University of South Carolina.

The archive, which spans Rash’s life from boyhood to the present, details his career as a poet, short story writer and novelist and joins other contemporary American literature collections at the university’s Ernest F. Hollings Special Collections Library. Among Rash’s award-winning works are the novel, “Serena,” which also was made into a movie, and the short story collection “Chemistry and Other Stories.”

Rash, disciplined in many aspects of life, has a daily regimen of exercise and writing. A novel can take him three years and 15 drafts, with his final draft always addressing sound and rhythm.

Those drafts, which convey the writing process, are part of the archive, which also features correspondence with writers, editors and publishers, research notes and materials in the development of his novels, short stories and poems, first editions of all his works, family history and genealogy and personal journals kept as a teenager.

Rash says he was particularly drawn by the university’s commitment to outreach and to have his archive available to students and scholars.

Rash’s stories have introduced and connected readers around the world to the Appalachia region of the South. And although he has spent most of his life in North Carolina, he is proud of his South Carolina roots, evident in many of his works and never far from his thoughts.

Rash’s archive joins many prominent collections acquired by the university in the last 25 years, including Conroy, Fitzgerald, Hemingway and James Dickey.

Select pieces of the Ron Rash Archive will be on display in an exhibit titled, “More than a Southern Author: Influences and Impact in the Works of Ron Rash,” in the Hollings Library through July 31. The gallery is open weekdays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and there will be a special open viewing 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, April 29.  Once processed by university archivists, the entire collection will be available to the public.

Ron Rash was born in Chester, South Carolina, in 1953 and grew up in Boiling Springs, North Carolina.

He is the author of the 2009 PEN/Faulkner finalist and New York Times bestselling novel “Serena,” in addition to five other novels, including “One Foot in Eden,” Saints at the River, “The World Made Straight” and “Above the Waterfall.”

 

 

A Conversation with Ron Rash

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Q:
Appalachia seems to remain hidden to many. Why?

Ron Rash:
My family has been there since the 1700s. It is mountainous and has tended to be a little more isolated than the rest of the South. The culture also is different. The accent is different (I don’t sound like Rhett Butler), the music is different, and even the food. I’m fascinated about how a place affects how a person perceives the world.

Q:
You’ve said writers from the South know a good story. How so?

Ron Rash:
While Southerners have done some things wrong, we know how to cook, make music and write. I think of Faulkner, Welty, O’Connor and Conroy. There is something to the story telling tradition, but I think maybe it is when a culture begins to do something well, such as jazz in New Orleans or bluegrass in Southern Appalachia, it builds momentum. Many Southern writers have written well and have achieved success at an international level. Their success opened up the possibility that I could this.

Q:
How does your writing transcend place?

Ron Rash:
People in Japan, France, Denmark and New Zealand recognize that I’m writing about all people. I’m answering the question of what it means to be human. If my writing is mere quaint, local color, I’d be doing a disservice as a writer. Eudora Welty said that one place comprehended helps us understand all other places better. The South has a certain mystique, but there is more than that. I’ve written novels that evoke questions that certainly are of the region but transcend to address how people can turn on each other in countries such as Rwanda or Germany.

Q:
Nearly all your work begins with a single image. Why?

Ron Rash:
It may be in part because I’m a poet. For whatever reason, it is never a plot or outline. I start with an image that slowly unfolds and leads me into a voice that leads me into a story. The more I write, the more mysterious the process is. It seems illogical to write a story without knowing the full story, but it works for me. I look at a particular image as the tip of an iceberg.

Q:
Why do you like short stories so much?

Ron Rash:
Short stories are the most challenging. A really good short story has everything that makes a good poem. Every word counts and the visual rhythms of reappearing images give the reader a sense of poetic rhythm. In 10 – 15 pages it melds that poetic and novelistic ability. It tells a reader there is no more story needed. Flannery O’Connor’s ‘A Good Man is Hard to Find’ is as perfect a short story I know. It’s amazing because every sentence is essential. I’ve read it 25 times, and I still find something I missed all the times before.

Q:
Tell us about your foundation in poetry.

Ron Rash:
I think it’s crucial. It makes me aware of language and making every syllable count. My last draft is always about sound. The goal is not for the readers to notice it, but that the language flows and their ear is hearing it whether conscious of it or not.

I attempt to write a novel in a book of poetry. My first book of poetry is about cotton mill work, about my grandparents. It was an important book to write. I wanted to honor that part of South Carolina, that mill village world that has disappeared. One thing that I feel good about is that this book, set in Chester, shows that world. I wanted it to honor those people. They worked hard lives to give my father and my generation a better life. I feel an immense gratitude.

Q:
What parallel do you draw between writing and exercise?

Ron Rash:
I was an athlete in high school and college. I’ve always been a driven person. Running was good training for being a writer. You train day in and day out. There are days I’d rather stick a pencil in my eye than write. Those are the days that make someone a writer. I work out one hour before I write, and I write every day, even on book tours and when traveling. I’ve told people that being a fiction writer is like being a mule in a big field where you try not to see how many rows are in front of you. There is a sense of dread starting a novel. I know I’ll be thinking about it every waking moment for the next three years. There is that instant when it all comes together. I never get over that excitement. Serena started as an image of a woman on horseback and ended up a 400-page novel.

Q:  
How did your grandfather teach you the magic of language?

Ron Rash:
My grandfather couldn’t read or write. One time I gave him, ‘The Cat in the Hat’ to read to me. He turned the pages and made up a story. I was 4 or 5 and couldn’t read. The words transmogrified and changed, and it was different story. It was like magic. The cat was in different mischief and later was looking at serious jail time. It was a disappointment to me later that words stayed on the page like bubble gum on a shoe sole.

Q:
Tell us about your relationship with writer Pat Conroy.

Ron Rash:
I grew up reading Pat and admiring him. I got to know him in the last 12 – 15 years and we became friends. He was always generous to me. He encouraged me and read my work. He was the first to congratulate me when I won the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award. If he was your friend, he’d back you to the very end. I don’t know anyone like him. He was a force larger than life. I cannot imagine that booming voice not being in the world. I miss him.