To find my own peace

by Grace Elizabeth King

"These previously unpublished private writings expand our understanding of Grace King (1852-1932) both as a writer and as a nineteenth-century, middle-class, white southern woman. A prolific New Orleans author whose work transcended the local-color genre popular in her day, King has long been admired for her versatility in many written forms, for her depictions of both black and white women in a variety of settings and situations, and for her insights into the intricate social structure of her native city." "Over a span of forty-six years, King produced four histories, three novels and two novellas, three collections of stories, two biographies, an autobiography, a play, and numerous articles and sketches. At age thirty-four she began a journal "to find my own peace in my own life." As Melissa Walker Heidari notes, King's journals offer "what is so lacking in her published autobiography: humor, irony, and a more candid assessment of herself and others. The Grace King of the autobiograp