| Title | : | The Ponder Heart |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0156729156 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780156729154 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 156 |
| Publication | : | First published January 1, 1954 |
| Awards | : | William Dean Howells Medal (1955) |
The Ponder Heart Reviews
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Eudora Welty has a great sense of humor, a deep understanding of character, and a delightful ability to channel Southern storytelling.
The Ponder Heart is told to us by Edna Earle Ponder, and it is like sitting in the Sunday parlor and listening to the day’s events rattled off by a maiden aunt, who never misses anything and has her own interpretation of it all. What I enjoyed the most were the very Southern expressions of Edna Earle, that sprang so easily from her lips and reminded me of the soothing sounds of my childhood.
It is Uncle Daniel’s story Edna Earle is telling, and it is peppered with observations about who Uncle Daniel is, in fact, who Ponders are in general. Uncle Daniel is a man who cannot control his on generosity, probably because he has never worked a day in his life and has no sense of the value of his own money.
And as for Uncle Daniel, he went right ahead, attracting love and friendship with the best will and the lightest heart in the world. He loved being happy! He loved happiness like I love tea.
Uncle Daniel’s happiness gets all tied up with the pleasing of Bonnie Dee Peacock, a young girl whom he makes his wife. The tale is rather tragic, but it is told in such a humorous tone that you never think to feel bad for any of the characters, only to laugh at them, until the story is over and the pathos hits you head on.
Money and its corrosive impact on society is part of the thematic structure of the story, but it is not Uncle Daniel who worships the money he possesses, it is others who alter their view of him because he has wealth. It is the society of others that really forms the center of Uncle Daniel’s life, not his wealth or even his infatuation with Bonnie Dee. For me, this was what made the ending suddenly saturated with all the sadness that had been buried beneath the laughter of the tale.
There’s something I think’s better to have than love, and if you want me to, I’ll tell you what it is–that’s company.
I am reading the correspondence of Eudora Welty and William Maxwell, and when the conversation turned to her publication of
The Ponder Heart, I realized this was one of Eudora’s works I had not read. I have stopped to correct the omission, and now back to the woman and the letters and a deeper understanding of the commentary. -
In The Ponder Heart (1953), narrator Edna Earle Ponder, proprietress of the little-frequented Beulah Hotel in Clay, Mississippi, tells one of her guests (who is there because the car broke down) the story of her wealthy Uncle Daniel—a sweet simple man, but rather “slow”—and how the Ponders tried to keep him from giving all his money away through two marriages, periodic commitments to “the asylum,” and one celebrated murder trial. The story itself is amusing, but the real beauty and glory of it all is the distinctive voice of Edna Earle herself, an intelligent, sharp-tongued and kind-hearted observer of the local scene. Miss Edna is a superb creation—a distinctive voice in American fiction right up there with Huckleberry Finn and Holden Caulfield.
Here follow three of Edna Earle Ponder’s memorable observations:Miss Teacake Magee lived here all her life. She sings in the choir of the Baptist Church every blessed Sunday; couldn’t get her out. And sings louder than all the rest put together, so loud it would make you lose your place…—her solo always came during collection, to cover up people rattling change and dropping money on the floor…
The Peacocks are the kind of people keep the mirror outside on the front porch, and go out and pick railroad lilies to bring inside the house, and wave at trains till the day they die. The most they probably hoped for was that somebody’d come find oil in the front yard and fly in the house and tell them about it.
I wish you could have seen Bonnie Dee!...Baby yellow hair, downy—like one of those danelion puff-balls you can blow and tell the time by. And not a brain beneath. Now Uncle Daniel may not have a whole lot of brains, but what’s there is Ponder, and no mistake about it. But poor little old Bonnie Dee! There’s a world of difference...She was little and she was dainty...But I could tell by her little coon eyes, she was shallow as they come. -
The older I get, the more I appreciate Welty's sly humor. The Ponder Heart takes place in a small town in Mississippi in 1922. A time before television and non-stop "breaking news" on a national and international stage, most people in out of the way places had to depend on travelers and visitors from larger areas to keep them abreast of goings on. Therefore, what happened locally was of supreme interest to everyone.
Uncle Daniel Ponder certainly gave the townspeople a lot to talk about. He suffered from arrested development, as it might be termed today. Sweet as could be, but not smart enough to really grasp entire situations that could possibly hurt him. He loved to talk, loved to give things away, and was entirely ruled by his impulses. A little eccentric and needing to be watched over. Which is where Edna Earle, his niece, comes into play. Now Edna Earle loves to talk too, and this is entirely narrated by her.
The language and the Southern idioms are reason enough to read this book. Of course, just like everyone else, Edna Earle looks down her nose at certain people, while forgetting that the Ponders may be just like them. The hypocrisy of most of her statements is hilarious. She knows how to tell a story though, and her account of the trial is like watching a movie. My edition also had some great pen and ink line drawings that fully illustrate the story. I understand this was made into a Broadway play in the 50's, and a movie later on, but the story was perfect without needing either of them. -
I grew up in Oklahoma, which is technically Midwest but identifies as South, so I can appreciate Welty's impressive recreation of a Mississippi drawl. But aside from that voice, I struggled to enjoy this one. It felt like the literary equivalent of eavesdropping on a one-sided telephone conversation. I didn't know who the narrator was talking about most of the time, but I could gather they were pieces of work.
Afterwards, I read a plot summary online and was shocked. It sounded like such a good story! None of that came off the page for me. I think the narrative structure, with information being filtered through a third-party character, made it difficult to follow who's who and what's what.
What plot I did understand was of the uncomfortable variety. I expect casual and overt racism in a novel published in the 1950s and set in the South, but it was disappointing to see Black characters largely reduced to idiots. Of course, we are limited by the narrator's Point of View, so there is realism in the depiction of race given the character. Still, even as a product of the 1950s, even set in the South, it's possible to humanize Black characters.
While I don't think this novel has much enduring value, it was very popular in its day. Before being published as a novel, it was serialized in the New Yorker to much acclaim. Then it was adapted into a Broadway play that won a Tony. In 1982 it was adapted again as an opera and in 2001 it became a television movie.
As for Eudora Welty, she'd go on to win the Pulitzer Prize for her 1972 novel The Optimist's Daughter. -
Just about perfect...certainly excellent, and so very beautifully of its time and place.
My full review is
posted here. -
Brilliant Southern small town dialog, this all coming from the mouth of our narrator Miss Edna Earle Ponder. She is one of two remaining Ponders in Clay, Mississippi circa 1950. Could irony have ever been done better? Miss Edna Earle tells the story of her Uncle Daniel Ponder and shows what is happening in their little world. The Ponder family is old South small town aristocracy and by the time of this story they are diminishing at a fast rate.
Uncle Daniel is thought of as “simple.” He loves everyone and wants everyone to love him back. It is evident he doesn’t have the prejudices of the old South—he’s too sweet to see them. Money means nothing to him in fact he can’t be stopped from giving it away. Miss Edna Earle grimly hangs on for the love of Uncle Daniel.
We hear it all from the narrator. She sees everything slipping away, the status, the money and the secure rigid social conditions. Edna Earle certainly knows white trash when she sees it. Well, bless their hearts.
The trial has the funniest courtroom scene ever concocted. Amazing. -
Quite simply a comic masterpiece by a master storyteller. Isn't there an award for humor named after Mark Twain? Did Welty receive it? If not, why not?!
*
I looked it up. The award's called "The Mark Twain Prize for American Humor." It was inaugurated only 15 years ago (and awarded only once to someone who's primarily a writer and not a performer), so that explains why Welty never received it. With no power granted to me at all, I hereby bestow it upon Eudora Welty, posthumously. -
The Ponder Heart is an inspired name for this book. At the center of the book is a ponderous simpleton with a big heart. He belongs to the Ponder family, the richest family in town. The book is mostly about the marriage between the old rich lovable loser - Daniel Ponder and a clueless, quiet and irritatingly stupid poor woman from a cantankerous poor family - Bonnie Dee Peacock. They could be the most pathetic married couple of all time. When Bonnie Dee suddenly drops dead, after leaving her husband, Daniel Ponder is accused of murdering her, by her family. A farcical trial follows.
Everything is told from the point of view of the strong female character - Edna Earle. Edna Earle looks out for her uncle Daniel Ponder who is happy to squander the family wealth and give money away to everyone in the small town of Clay, Mississippi. She is one of the main people around town, and runs the family hotel. The book is an account of a bunch of pathetic, eccentric and clueless characters, told from the point of view of Edna Earle who knows what's going on and what should be done in a crisis situation.
This is my first encounter with Welty's writing. The book is funny at times. Especially the dialog. Nice characterization and story. But I didn't really care for it. Cannot put my finger on what was wrong with it. Maybe the characters were a bit too pathetic and they were told from the point of view of a strong person who was clearly contemptuous of their shenanigans. A third person narrative might have worked better. -
“There’s something I think’s better to have than love, and if you want me to, I’ll tell you what it is--that’s company.”
Eudora Welty does go on. In this story, her character Edna Earle relays to a visitor the foibles of her eccentric Uncle Daniel Ponder, who loves nothing more than to give things away. He gave Edna Earle the hotel she runs, where she has presumably cornered her guest to hear Uncle Daniel’s whole story.
Like my favorite Welty story
Why I Live at the P.O, this is a quirky monologue that I imagine readers will either love or hate. Other than some troubling racism that was probably true enough for the time and place, I loved it. Why I Live at the P.O. is much better though I think--even quirkier.
Here’s some bits that made me giggle, just to give a taste of Edna Earle’s voice:
“I was up there in my room, reading some directions. That’s something I find I like to do when I have a few minutes to myself--I don’t know about you. How to put on furniture polish, transfer patterns with a hot iron, take off corns, I don’t care what it is. I don’t have to do it. Sometimes I’d rather sit still a minute and read a good quiet set of directions through than any story you’d try to wish off on me.”
“'I’ll break your neck,’ ‘I’ll skin you alive,’ ‘I’ll beat your brains out’--Mercy! How that does bring Grandma back.” -
Loved it — Welty is such a great storyteller!
You couldn’t say this was just plot driven, although the plot was interesting with its narrative revealed in an interesting way. The characters were fascinating. And the colloquial speech seemed both authentic and original.
Daniel Ponder, a man of wealth who loves to talk, has a big heart and loves to give away all that falls into his hands. His niece and heir, Edna Earle Ponder, loves him but would prefer he not do that. Daniel marries a seventeen year old girl “no bigger than a minute.” When she dies, her family thinks Daniel murdered her and they want him tried. Edna relates the tale.
I felt like Edna Earle was talking directly to me. She put me right there in the small town in Mississippi. And, as judgmental as she was as she was recounting the events, the reader cannot help but to form judgments about her. Now, I will admit, I cringed at the casual instances of inherent racism in the story, but still, on the whole, this was a great reading (listening) experience.
4.5 stars. -
Wonderful, delightful book. Review to follow.
-
3 stars
Edna Earle Ponder, the story narrator, is a force of nature and you find instead of giving yourself over to her story telling that she takes the control and carries you along on her journey. She tells the story of her Uncle Daniel and his impressive life, in relationship to their Southern upbringing.
I have not read but one other Eudora Welty story and I have found them both entertaining and informative on the lives and times portrayed. Her high intellect and creative powers make reading her work like a trip back in time, a mini vacation from today's disorder, and a reminder of a less chaotic place in time. -
“Come on in and make yourself comfortable. I have the tea and cakes all ready and in the sitting room. I am so glad you could take my invitation, as you were asking about my Uncle Daniel. If you sit right down I’ll tell you a story you won’t believe, but as sure as my name is Edna Earle Ponder, I swear every word will be true.”
It is in this spirit that author Welty tells us the story of Edna Earle’s legendary Uncle Daniel. Just a tale of her uncle told as if the reader were sitting right next to Eudora and not missing a single word. It is an interesting, occasionally uncomfortable, tour of Mississippi in 1953, complete with what I assume would be believable descriptions of southern life at that time – just before the beginning of the civil rights movement. But that is tangential to the story of Daniel Ponder, a dear heart, naïve as a newborn and very, very rich by contemporary standards. Foolishly rich and goodhearted, to be frank. Welty weaves her tale through a few months of the man’s life in this small-town, impoverished setting.
The book is not much on anyone’s radar just now, and the plot is not sophisticated, but there is wry humor and good character development to make this very short book worth reading. Earlier I read Welty’s Pulitzer Prize winner, ¨The Optimist’s Daughter,” but that is written in an entirely different voice.
It is Summer! Time to read some classic Southern literature!! And so I did. -
"Se uma pessoa não encontra outro prazer na vida que não seja falar — pois então que fale. Sobretudo se não temos nada para fazer e não somos inteligentes a pontos de preferir o silêncio."
-
I do enjoy reading Eudora Welty and Ponder Heart is her at an almost silly best. The characters can only exist in that southern town; even the Peacock family are strange in a completely different way and obviously from “away”. This is a book to be read not learned about second hand. How else can you understand Uncle Daniel’s trial, Edna Earle and the Beulah Hotel, the judge who might not be a lawyer, who went to the asylum and why, and on and on. Edna Earle is a Ponder (though not THE Ponder) and a wonderful narrator, especially since she knows everything and everyone in the area, including secrets and gossip.
You should pick up a copy of this short read and enjoy it’s sly but often outrageous humor and the sad/happy citizens of Clay, Mississippi. -
From the blurb on the back of my edition:
"For sheer imagination and comedy, for sustained narrative power and its miraculous reproduction of the rhythm of Southern small-town speech - often amounting to outright poetry - the story represents Miss Welty at her magical best." San Francisco Chronicle
I might quibble with magical "best" but not with the idea of her magical (and mesmerizing) writing. It takes a while to get used to the outdated notions of race, but then this was set in 1923 when this is how things were. This was a short and fun read with indelible, memorable characters.
Why I'm reading this: This is the August pick for the GR group On the Southern Literary Trail, one of my favorite groups to read with and discuss books! -
Eudora Welty’s The Ponder Heart is a novella that has a light comedic feel, a little dark humor, and just enough of Southern flavor to make it a fun, quick read. Narrated by Edna Earle, citizen of Clay County, it tells of the character of Daniel Ponder, Edna’s “simple” but good natured uncle. Daniel is the kind of guy who would give you anything he has; if he doesn’t have it, he’d try to find it just so he could give it to you. Being that Uncle Daniel has such a generous personality, it is up to Edna to keep tabs on him and make sure he doesn’t get into too much trouble, or give every single possession away. As you could imagine, this is quite a task for our narrator. Edna narrates a few of the oddball episodes in Daniel’s life, including his foiling a plan to have him institutionalized, as well as his two failed marriages. Edna’s narrative zeroes in on his second marriage to seventeen year old Bonnie Dee. Bonnie Dee is a tiny thing, sort of doll like, and a bit materialistic. When Bonnie Dee dies under mysterious circumstances, good old Uncle Daniel suddenly finds himself charged with murder. A humorously bizarre court trial ensues, which pits many of the Ponder clan against the family of Bonnie Dee, all with Uncle Daniel and the late Bonnie being the center of attention. Testimony and crazy antics ensue as family lawyer tries to prove Uncle Daniel innocent.
Most enjoyable about this novel is simply Edna Earle’s narrative voice, and the light hearted tone she gives to the book. She understands and empathizes with Daniel throughout all. Revealed in her narration are some insightful thoughts into Daniel’s nature of just being a good hearted person.
The book is a little too light at times, but still a fun read. I think Welty’s short stories give much more weight and power to the themes she explores. -
I read this little gem as a part of the July 2013 group reads in the group On the Southern Literary Trail.
In most of the rural South (including present day) there are certain unspoken rules regarding which families' potato salads are "safe" to eat and which ones are to be avoided at all costs. Most of these "laws to live by" have less to do with flavor or pathogens than they have to do with family lines that should not cross. Children learn these lessons from the time they can fix their own plates at covered dish dinners to welcome the new preacher or lighten a family's load directly after a loved one is lowered into the ground. "It's fine to sample Alma's cooking, but you need to avoid Lucille's beans....I hear they aren't much count".
It's in that spirit the Welty tackles this quick witted little tale of a most peculiar man who is loved by everyone, but fails to connect with not one but TWO spouses (the second following much too soon after the first to be accepted by most at the time this was published). I am sure there are far deeper satirical themes in play, but for now I enjoyed the story on the surface level.
Daniel Potter is good "hearted", giving, fun, and yet, these character traits only earn him heartache in his most personal relationships. He's the least stingy person, yet misfortune follows him like a curse. The book is narrated by his persnickety niece (quasi sister/mother figure) Edna Earl who values her opinion on all things Uncle Daniel far more than I suspect he values it.
There are overtones of race, greed, gender, sexual desire, and family dynamic but all told in a way that keeps you laughing. It's "As I Lay Dying" minus the parts that make you cringe or lead to weeks of dreams. Most enjoyable......in a few days I will Google to see what all I missed. -
One of my GR buddies reviewed this book, commenting on the hilarious courtroom scene and I seemed to remember reading some of her stories back in high school so decided to order a copy, used of course. I enjoyed the story, great sense of place and characterization if a bit unbelievable in places. Short and sweet.
Her name rang a bell so I went to the bookshelves in my office and found a copy of "The Optimist's Daughter" for which she won a Pulitzer prize in 1973 so here is another addition to the "To Be Read" pile. So it goes in the serendipitous world of book selection! -
DNF
Pensei que ia fazer as pazes com Eudora Welty, depois de ter detestado A Filha do Optimista, já que o tom humorístico de O Coração dos Ponders parecia estar a resultar melhor comigo, mas não, ainda não foi desta. O problema desta autora é que as personagens dela não têm densidade nenhuma, não passam de caricaturas e, mais uma vez, há a numerosa família de parolos, que não têm graça nem originalidade nenhuma. No fundo, é mais do mesmo. -
From 1953
All from the voice of one character, Edna Earle Ponder. All about her Uncle Daniel, who is the same age as her (40s or maybe 50s). At first it was just a fun, very southern, fable. But then Daniel's second wife, young Bonnie Dee, dies unexpectedly, and there is an entertaining murder trial.
Honestly, there is part, with the hovering, flying fireball, where I was uncertain if it is meant to be magical realism or what. -
I did not read The Ponder Heart as a separate book but am treating it as if I did for purposes of marking the review. I actually read the story as a part of
Complete Novels . This is the July 2013 read for the group On the Southern Literary Trail. As a transplanted southerner, I have been introduced to many southern writers by this GR group.
The Ponder Heart was published by the New Yorker magazine in 1953
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/1953... and by Harcourt in book form in 1954 when Ms. Welty was forty-five. This was her first illustrated book. Shortly after its publication, Ms. Welty signed an option for the book to be made into a Broadway play where it had a four month run. An operatic version was also produced. In 2001 a public broadcasting Masterpiece Theatre TV movie was added to the list of adaptations. Regrettably, I have not seen any of these presentations.
The southern genre is known for its quirky characters. In this book there are several candidates for quirky but Daniel Ponder is far ahead of all others. He likes to give away his many possessions and ultimately succeeds in giving everything away. His trial marriage to a seventeen year old is just one example of his generosity. He leaves his house while his young wife stays and spends his money on fancy clothes and home improvements. The first person narrator Edna Earle Ponder is also alive with idiosyncrasies and individuality behind a veneer of normalcy, at least as compared to Uncle Daniel.Her breathless, backhanded, first person singular has been caught, word by awful word, in all its affectionate self-importance, by a writer with a wonderful ear.
Source:
http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/11/22...
Ponder is an example of novels by southern authors set in small southern towns. One of the most well known of these is To Kill a Mockingbird.
This is an enjoyable short book, one that could be called comic. In 2012 it was called “one of the ten best comic works in literature” in the Christian Science Monitor. It is a dramatic monologue with its impressive first person narrative. I enjoyed reading it more than I have enjoyed other Welty offerings. I give it three stars rather than four simply because I did not enjoy it that much!
-
I read this because it was one of the July picks for the
On the Southern Literary Trail group here in GoodReads. Since moving to the south, I've wanted to read more southern authors! This was originally published in the New Yorker, and my paperback had illustrations too. It is very light, very southern, and I felt like I recognized a few of the characters in the pages.
Underneath the lightness is a deeper commentary on relationships.
"I don't know if you can measure love at all. But Lord knows there's a lot of it, and seems to me from all the studying I've done over Uncle Daniel - and he loves more people than you and I put together ever will - that if the main one you've set your heart on isn't speaking for your love, or is out of your reach some way, married or dead, or plain nitwitted, you've still got that love banked up somewhere."
from Edna Earle's testimony in court:
"It was a perfectly normal household. Threats flew all the time."
I baked a
Never Fail Devils Food Cake that Welty mentions in the pages. -
Debaixo da aparente normalidade desta importante e educada família sulista, escondem-se laivos de loucura absolutamente hilariantes.
A leitura deste livro, está recheada de um humor subtil, divertidíssimo. -
Edna Earle Ponder
Eudora Welty's taut, comic short novel "The Ponder Heart" received the William D. Howells' Medal for fiction from the Academy of Arts and Letters in 1955. A prestigious award from a scholarly organization, the Howells Medal is awarded every five years to the American novel deemed best during this period. Upon publication of "The Ponder Heart" in book form in 1954, Welty's editor, William Maxwell, wrote a letter to her about the work. Maxwell noted that while the early reviews praised the novel, the reviews for the most part were "excruciatingly stupid". He declined to pass them on to Welty. Maxwell wrote that h e "winced his way" through the reviews and "wished somebody would have had the sense -- somebody with his head on his shoulders -- to say that The Ponder Heart is a comic masterpiece and let it go at that". Maxwell compared the book to Huckleberry Finn, finding that "the more times you have read it, the better it is." Maxwell's letter, dated January 11, 1954, is included in a recent book of the Welty-Maxwell correspondence edited by Suzanne Marrs, "What There Is to Say We Have Said: The Correspondence of Eudora Welty and William Maxwell". Reading the correspondence prompted me to read Welty's novel.
Set in a small town called Clay, Mississippi in the late 1940's, the story is narrated in its entirety by Edna Earle Ponder who operates the Hotel Beulah in the decaying downtown of Clay. The Ponder family is the wealthiest family in Clay, but at the time the story begins, only three members of the Ponder line remain, Sam, the Grandfather, his youngest son Daniel, and Sam's granddaughter, Edna Earle. Edna Earle is in her 40's, unmarried, and with fears of dying an old maid. Besides the hotel, the family properties include a large old house three miles outside of Clay, known as Ponder Hill. The Grandfather dies early in the story, making Uncle Daniel and Edna Earle the chief protagonists as well as the heirs to his fortune.
Edna Earle's tale centers upon her Uncle Daniel who is approximately her own age. Uncle Daniel appears to be a simple soul, kind and generous. He gives property away unstintingly to friends and strangers alike and eventually takes to passing out the family cash. Daniel's father said that the boy must have been waiting in the other room when brains were passed out. With the prompting of his family, Daniel makes a short marriage to a widow named Teacake which ends after two months. Daniel is institutionalized. Upon his release, he meets a young addle-brained girl, Bonnie Dee Peacock, 17, trash from a small neighboring town called Polk. Bonnie Dee agrees to marry Uncle Daniel "for trial", and she leaves him after five years. When she returns, she orders Uncle Daniel to leave the house on Ponder Hill. Shortly thereafter, Edna Mae and Daniel return to the house at Bonnie Dee's invitation during a severe lightening storm. When Bonnie Dee is found dead, Daniel is charged with murder and tried.
Maxwell's comparison of Welty's book to "Huckleberry Finn" is apt because in both books more is going on that might appear on a first casual reading. It seems to me Maxwell is correct in concluding that it is useless to over-intellectualize the book beyond recognizing it as a "comic masterpiece". The doings and the characters are ruined by paraphrase.
The book is full of sharp, detailed observations of places external and internal -- the Mississippi of Welty's day and the ambiguities of character -- the hearts of the Ponders and others. Uncle Daniel and his sweet improvidence is the center of Edna Earle's concern. Roughly the first half of the book describes the Ponder family and the towns of Clay and Polk while the second part describes Uncle Daniel's murder trial through Edna Earle's voice with portrayals of the old state judge, the bumbling attorneys, and a strange concatenation of witnesses and testimony. A brief but critical denouement follows the result of the trial.
As the book progresses, the focus of the story shifts from Uncle Daniel and the town to the garrulous Edna Earle herself. Welty captures her voice, mannerisms and character in speech and behavior that is entirely Edna Earle's own. She is both precise and mysterious. The reader learns to see events through Edna Earle's eyes before learning to see through Edna Earle and understanding her for herself. She is the prototypical unreliable narrator.
The story has an undoubtedly light, flippant character; but as so often, surfaces and ease can be deceptive. The book bears careful reading and some digging. "The Ponder Heart" merited William Maxwell's praise and the National Academy's Howells Medal.
Robin Friedman -
I purchased this book from a second-hand shop, based on the description/blurb on the back cover. It sat on my shelves for a few months unopened till I picked it up to read the other day. To my surprise (shock), on the inner cover was written my mother’s name in the way she spells it (different from the way it is usually spelt). It wasn’t her old book that had found its way back to us (she hasn’t ever read it), but an odd coincidence nevertheless. Now for the actual book.
This was my first novel by the author. The story is told in the voice of Edna Earle Ponder who tells us of the Ponder family or what’s left of it, essentially herself, her Grandpa, and Uncle Daniel. Edna Earle runs the Beulah Hotel, which originally belonged to her Grandma, and which she is “given” by Uncle Daniel. Uncle Daniel, who according to Grandpa Ponder was “behind a door” when the almighty was handing out brains, is a good-hearted, and good-tempered eccentric, but “simple”, and given to loving people (pretty much everyone he meets), giving away his property, and loquaciousness. His first marriage doesn’t work out for both parties but when he suddenly marries a seventeen-year-old Bonnie Dee Peacock, a dainty creature who agrees to marry him on “trial”, the Ponders’ lives are affected in a way they would never have expected.
I enjoyed the writing and the humour in this short novel which is for the most part a light-hearted tale (though there are a few touches (but touches only) of melancholy) of life in a small town, and of people whose lives revolve around that town (so much so that even nearby towns seem too far away). Uncle Daniel too is a likeable character, with his eccentricities, and child-like enjoyment of everything, whether it be the fair that comes into town (where he distributes banana ices to the girls doing a dance, right in the midst of a performance) or giving away his possessions. Edna too one likes for understanding and being there for Uncle Daniel. What I enjoyed most though was what turned out to be a murder mystery (complete with trial) in the story. I wasn’t sure what to expect and the solution when we were told it was as eccentric as the characters, themselves. An enjoyable read. (The word n_ _ _ _ appears throughout but matter of factly rather than as a slur―still it isn’t PC).
As always I never remembered to mark out lines which I enjoyed but a couple are:
“Intrepid Elsie Fleming rode a motor-cycle around the Wall of Death―which let her do if she wants to ride a motor-cycle that bad.”
“Of course, Polk did use to be on the road. But the road left and it didn’t get up and follow, and neither did the Peacocks. Up until Bonnie Dee.” -
At this point I've read all of Welty's (very few) novels excepting Losing Battles (which I'm about to start), and this one is an oddity of the bunch. Like in Optimist's Daughter and Delta Wedding she's got that precise sense of place (the town is not focused on to a great extent, yet it feels populated and breathing around Daniel and Edna) and measured clarity of psychological character (this one adds a layer by being in first person, and thus the characterization is one-sided, but there is warmth to Edna's narration that suffuses Daniel and Grandpa with gentle light; Edna is also characterized almost entirely via her narration, and this is as well plotted and developed as Welty's more standard direct descriptions) - but unlike the other's, this one is actually a light comedy, and is pretty funny (not in a laugh out loud kind of way but in an amusing kind of way).
[there a moments of humor - typically through conversations of the recounting of a humorous event - in the other Welty novels, it's just that this one is written cover to cover as a comedy]
I like Edna as a narrator, and I think she's perfectly well developed, but placing all the words into a single character appears to have constricted Welty's typically beautiful prose, and this lack makes this fairly short novel (novella?) feel weaker, or at least lighter, than the others I've read.
I'm getting pretty hyped for her short stories though - in a handful of novels she's shown a range of styles and a depth of skill, I'm intrigued to read more variety from her, especially as she is primarily known for the short stories vs novels. -
“O Coração dos Ponders” é uma história familiar narrada por Edna Earle Ponder, da qual no início já só restam o seu avô Ponder e o seu tio Daniel.
A narrativa é dominada pelos comportamentos díspares do excêntrico tio Daniel, que oscilam entre a normalidade e a loucura, em dois cenários primordiais, o Hotel Beulah, que Edna recebeu de herança do tio, e a casa senhorial da família Ponders.
Um nunca mais acabar de histórias hilariantes, entre o cómico e o trágico, numa escrita de Eudora Welty imaginativa e poética. -
Good read!
I bought the companion Audible version of The Ponder Heart and especially enjoyed the narration as I read along. The Southern accent seemed authentic to me, well done!
I appreciate the story for its portrayal of Southern folk and their historical background although the book did make me cringe a bit at times, Welty wrote her stories a while ago.
This story is a snapshot of the way many of the folks in my MS hometown lived and spoke. Reminds me of home and the way it was. -
Oh Eudora Welty, why can’t I quit you?
It’s because I bought her complete novels a few years ago, and well, I feel stuck reading them all.
This one was not bad though for a few reasons. It was goofy and had a clear voice to it. The character of Daniel Ponder is a really truly vexing character. He’s terrible with money, obsessed with women, has no moral core, and just seems bent of accidentally destroying his niece’s life.
Edna Earle tells early on how bad he is about giving away fortune. “Things I could think of without being asked that he’s given away would be–a string of hams, a fine suit of clothes, a white-faced heifer calf, two trips to Memphis, a pair of fantail pigeons, fine Shetland pony (loves children), brooder and incubator, good nanny goat, bad billy, cypress cistern, field of white Dutch clover, two iron wheel and some laying pullets (they were together), cow pasture during drouth (he has everlasting springs), innumerable fresh eggs, a pick-up truck–even his own cemetery lot, but they wouldn’t accept it. And I’m not counting this week. He’s been a general favorite all these years.”
The novel deals with an old theme, how do we handle our responsibilities to our family, especially when they are so undeserving of care and attention? Edna Earle is clearly the more deserving of her grandfather’s fortune both in need and in worth, but because Daniel is the older, but lesser, he gets the fortune.
