Description: Autobiographers typically mine memory to write of a struggle for place. For some, that place is wealth, fame, or power. For others it's overcoming the wounds of addiction or an abusive past to find a place of stability. As compelling as those stories can be, this autobiography is different. Dupuy comes from a large, intact Catholic family, in which he was well-cared for. While he explores memory and writes of a struggle for place, he finds place and person not necessarily within, but between, established boundaries. He restlessly explores spaces between and among narratives of family, nation, career, religion, and culture. And he finds glimpses of an elusive and wounded subject--himself. A strong sense of longing, a sense of not quite being at home--a type of woundedness--pervades his story. Such places reveal themselves to him not as deficits, not something to be corrected and set straight; instead, he sees them as a sort of home, despite their shaky, between nature. In these spaces, new contours of self, others, and world have opened to him.
Brief description:
Edward J. Dupuy, retired college senior administrator and educator, is the author of Autobiography in Walker Percy: Repetition, Recovery, and Redemption. He guest-edited a special edition of the Southern Quarterly on the works of Lewis Nordan and has written scholarly essays, reviews, and some poetry. With Gene Beyt, he co-hosts the podcast "Artists Telling Stories." In 2023, he moved to Tacoma, Washington with his spouse Jan Fluitt-Dupuy to be near their three children and grandchildren.