Dean Faulkner Wells – författare

In Every Day by the Sun, Dean Faulkner Wells recounts the story of the Faulkners of Mississippi, whose legacy includes pioneers, noble and ignoble war veterans, three never-convicted mur­derers, the builder of the first railroad in north Mississippi, the founding president of a bank, an FBI agent, four pilots (all brothers), and a Nobel Prize winner, arguably the most important Ameri­can novelist of the twentieth century. She also reveals wonderfully entertaining and intimate stories and anecdotes about her family—in particular her uncle William, or “Pappy,” with whom she shared color­ful, sometimes utterly frank, sometimes whimsical, conversations and experiences.              This deeply felt memoir explores the close re­lationship between Dean’s uncle and her father, Dean Swift Faulkner, a barnstormer killed at age twenty-eight during an air show four months be­fore she was born. It was William who gave his youngest brother an airplane, and after Dean’s tragic death, William helped to raise his niece. He paid for her education, gave her away when she was married, and maintained a unique relationship with her throughout his life.                         From the 1920s to the early civil rights era, from Faulkner’s winning of the Nobel Prize in Literature to his death in 1962, Every Day by the Sun explores the changing culture and society of Oxford, Mis­sissippi, while offering a rare glimpse of a notori­ously private family and an indelible portrait of a national treasure. From the Hardcover edition.

For every published article there is a backstory of behind-the-scenes adventures. Between 1980 and 2000, Dean Faulkner Wells and Lawrence Wells traveled coast to coast on magazine assignments. Backstory: A Literary Life on the Run reveals how unexpected events played a major role in each article. The collection of twenty-five articles begins with Dean’s interview with Willie "Suicide" Jones, her late father’s wing walker and fellow barnstormer, and ends with Dean’s fond recollection of a childhood Christmas at Rowan Oak, home of her uncle William Faulkner. In between, the couple travels to Wounded Knee, scene of the tragic massacre of Big Foot and his band of Sioux, where Dean tears out a lock of hair and ties it to a fence in spiritual kinship. In Little Rock, the couple spends an evening with authors Charles Portis and Dee Brown. In San Francisco, they interview California jazz artists "Wild Mango" and singer/guitarist Joyce Cooling. They drive the Santa Fe Trail and tour Palo Duro Canyon near Amarillo, Texas. There are personal moments such as attending author Budd Schulberg’s wedding reception in Montauk, New York, and dining at the home of Jackson Pollock’s widow, Lee Krasner. At a Memorial Day party in Long Island, film star Lauren Bacall tells Dean, "Hey, you sound more like me than me!" In Daphne, Alabama, Dean visits her longtime friend Peets Buffett, mother of Jimmy Buffett. In a Louisiana swamp, Larry has trouble finding an alligator to photograph until Dean points to a gator dozing at his feet. In Las Vegas, Dean’s addiction to slot machines leads to a domestic squabble. Ultimately, Backstory reveals a marriage of mind and spirit.