The Welcome

by Hubert Creekmore

Achieving the same pity and sincerity of his first Fingers of Night (1946) this presents Ashton, Mississippi, as a deceptively sterile, conforming, blindly respectable background for the drama of the friendship between Don Mason and Jim Furlow. Don, who was driven to New York by Jim's marriage to coldly selfish, emptyheaded Doris, returns home, routed by the depression of the '30's, and intensifies Jim's misery with Doris, watches him sink into heavier drinking, more unbearable self-torture, Doris, taking advantage, bargains for a Lincoln in return for bearing Jim's child, is forever entrenched against any possibility of divorce. Don is slowly attracted by Isabel, once Jim's girl, but now emphasizing her eccentricities to compensate for being an old maid. Between them moves Tray, really happily married to Bea, who tries to unlock the secrets of the three, who nears success when he makes Isabel aware of the thwarted love between Jim and Don. Her honesty in confronting Don with her knowledge and understanding of the problems of the past -- and present -- is the reason he proposes, and it is at their marriage that Jim is made to acknowledge his selfish egotism, his blind jealousy. A precise handling -- neither clinical nor sensational -- of a marital as well as a psychological theme, this offers a well integrated novel of character as well as of emotion.

-- Kirkus Reviews

Genres: Fiction

307 pages, Hardcover

First published October 20, 1948

Reviews

[Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is interesting in that it is written by a Southerner and takes place in Mississippi, but may as well have taken place in Indiana or California. It has none of the mid-century "Southerness" that I expect (perhaps shame on me?).

In terms of characters, it's complicated for me. The most interesting characters to me are Don and Isabel, but I don't think Creekmore took them far enough. Isabel is drawn as an unconventional, forward-thinking woman, yet her only desire is to get married and fit into the social stratification of the town? Don can't stand the town and it's trappings, yet returns and feels drawn to it? The most redeeming thing about these contradictions is their marriage, which is honest as they enter into it fully understanding the reasoning behind it.

Which, of course, is in contrast to Doris and Jim. They are both sad examples of how marriage can work. I think a longer discourse comparing Doris and Jim to Isabel and Don could be interesting.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was predisposed to like this just because I bought it at Violet Valley, the only LGBTQ+ feminist bookstore in Mississippi. Y'all gotta get there. And because I've been to Water Valley where the novel is set, I could easily imagine the doings and goings on. Loved that.

It's a really interesting novel, set in a small Mississippi town in the 1930s. Although the word homosexual is never used (until the very end when it is said in as a slur in anger and it is used in a way to deliberately shock) , it is clear that Don and Jim had an emotional attachment in high school. Don goes off to NYC and Jim stays behind and marries a girl from a neighboring town, quite unhappily. When Don returns to take care of his invalid mother (as a Southern friend of mine would day - she enjoyed poor health) , it is clear that the feelings are all still there.

In some ways, the book is more an inditement of heteronormativity - the expectation that marriage is the norm and anything that deviates from that is problematic. What Creekmore doesn't see is how that affects women - the novel has a more of a touch of misogyny - as much as men, whether they are gay or straight. I did like the way the novel boldly ends with everyone married off - like a Shakespearean comedy when it's really a tragedy for so many involved.

The 'n' word does appear a few times and as mentioned above, there is some misogyny that had me rolling my eyes. But very worth reading. Creekmore, who was actually Eudora Welty's
bother-in-law was a fairly prolific writer and well worth checking out.

[coco's reading · Rating 4 out of 5]

So much discussed in The Welcome remains relevant seventy-five years later—the way people respond to queerness differently, how folks tend to conform to those around them for fear of ostracization, the fact that marriage doesn't necessitate a perfect union or life. Creekmore critiqued many aspects of society that we still deal with in the twenty-first century, and even though his portrayal of women wasn't the most flattering, I think that was the point: to show what people can turn into if they focus on marrying out of the belief that it'll guarantee fulfillment in a way being a bachelor or bachelorette never can. The storytelling was strong, especially when it came to how the author shifted perspective chapter to chapter, showing the characters at different points and through different eyes. Tray was undoubtedly the MVP; everyone needs a Tray in their life. And that fact that neither Jim nor Don died proves that there can be impactful queer stories that don't end happily but also don't lean into the "kill your gays" trope, something authors have known long before LGBT literature became prevalent. It was absolutely wonderful to read a long-forgotten Mississippi novel, especially one brazen enough to tackle the topics it did, when it did.

[Martin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an out of print 1948 novel reissued due to it's gay subject matter. It is the story of two close male friends in a small Mississippi town during the depression. One man goes to live in NYC after other man chooses to get married. The author's style is slow and stodgy with long run on sentences. Reading the first three parts is almsot like watching paint dry- dull and boring.. The narrative and story picks up speed and depth in Part 4 and draws to a satisfying conclusion. The small town life is pictured as bleak when you don't have anyone with whom to share. I am happy to have finished it and in the end was impressed by the author's handling of such a difficult subject but it was a tough read!

[Bill · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of my favorite things about this book was the shop where I discovered it, by chance and good luck, on Main Street in Water Valley, Mississippi. Violet Valley Bookstore is the only queer, feminist, transinclusive bookstore in the state of Mississippi, and Creekmore’s 1948 novel is, according to Phillip Gordon’s introduction to the 2023 reprinting, “a forgotten literary masterpiece with a visionary commentary on the human heart and its universal, if too-often-denied, longings;” and according to W. Ralph Eubanks in his 2021 A Place Like Mississippi, an “underground classic.” Follow and support Violet Valley at violetvalley.org, @violetvalleybooks on Instagram, on Facebook, or at jaimeharker.com/violetvalley

[Megan Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow! An incredibly forward-thinking book for its time. Queerness is not a tragedy here as it was in other books of the time. Here Creekmore shows that even in the early twentieth century, a tragedy is the profound loss of betraying one's own sense of self and happiness in order to accept societal norms. It is a shame this book has remained relatively unknown, rather than the widely-acclaimed pioneer of queer literature it deserves to be.