For nearly sixty years, Eudora Welty and William Maxwell, two of our most distinguished writers, penned letters to each other. They shared their worries about work and family, literary
opinions and scuttlebutt, moments of despair and hilarity. Living half a continent apart, their friendship was nourished and maintained by their correspondence. Chock-full of reading
recommendations, What There Is to Say We Have Said also bears witness to Welty and Maxwell’s editorial relationships—both in his capacity as New Yorker editor and in their
collegial back-and-forth on their work. It’s also a chronicle of the literary world of the time; read talk of James Thurber, William Shawn, Katherine Anne Porter, J.D. Salinger, Isak
Dinesen, William Faulkner, John Updike, Gertrude Stein, Walker Percy, Ford Maddox Ford, John Berryman, and many more. Here, Suzanne Marrs—Welty’s biographer and friend—offers an
unprecedented window into two intertwined lives. Through careful collection of these 300 letters as well as her own insightful introductions, she has created a record of a remarkable
friendship, an illuminating look at artists in community, and a lyrical homage to the forgotten art of letter writing.
