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Roanoke Colonies Research Newsletter
The Lost Colony Found?: A Southern Life: Letters of Paul Green, 1916-1981 and Paul Green’s Celebration of Man by Krystal Messer Roanoke Colonies Research Office Are you searching for the “Lost Colony”? Well, search no further. The Lost Colony, Paul Green’s play that is, can be found in a recent intriguing and vastly informative collection entitled A Southern Life: Letters of Paul Green, 1916-1981 (Chapel Hill: U of North Carolina P, 1994). Editor Laurence G. Avery does a superb job of sorting through Green’s mountains of correspondence, organizing the letters into clear and concise chapters. You will not find a large amount of actual historical information concerning the “Lost Colony,” but you will find a detailed explanation of the development and design of Green’s plays, particularly The Lost Colony. Everything you need to know about the first and perhaps most well known major outdoor drama is revealed through Green’s letters. The Lost Colony is fully documented from its point of origin to its actual first performance. In fact, Avery devotes an entire chapter to the play and even includes a photograph of a performance during the play’s first season. The letters Avery includes in this chapter reveal Green’s surprise reaction at the success and popularity of The Lost Colony. Green writes, “Last summer I wrote a musical historical drama based on the accounts of Sir Walter Raleigh’s attempts to settle this country, and to my joy, and somewhat surprise considering, it turned out to be a great success” (282). The letters found in The Lost Colony chapter are useful for anyone interested in studying the development of the first outdoors drama, but perhaps more interesting are the annotations. What may be unclear in the letters the annotations will make clear. Avery provides extensive details in the annotations, adding more information to an already informative and useful collection. Scholars who may need a break from the world of strictly literary research should refer to letters addressed to North Carolina senator Jesse Helms. The letters should be of particular interest for those concerned with the political and spirited personality of Green. Perhaps the most interesting letters are the ones concerning the arms race, such as that of July 3, 1979, in which Green writes, “You know, Jesse, that if this arms race continues, and ill-feeling with it, someone is going to ‘pull the trigger,’ and the world will be engulfed in flames. Mankind’s survival is at stake. This fact is enough to give you voice, speaking our voice ‘the people’s voice’”(698). Another recent book detailing Paul Green’s career is Paul Green’s Celebration of Man (ed. Sue Laslie Kimball and Lynn Veach Sadler [Sanford, NC: Human Technology Interface, 1994]). The book is a collection of papers given at the Sixth Annual Southern Writers. Symposium, held at Methodist College, Fayetteville, North Carolina, March 27-28, 1987. Several of these papers treat the play The Lost Colony in passing or as the paper’s main subject (For titles of specific articles, see “Additions to the 1994 Checklist” below). Perhaps what makes this book most useful for Lost Colony scholars is its vast bibliography. It lists at least five pages of articles, interviews, books, etc., solely about The Lost Colony. There are several pages of bibliography devoted to Green’s other works as well. Scholars of Roanoke colonization won’t find the historical “Lost Colony” in these books. However, Paul Green’s career is fascinating to read about and should be of interest to North Carolina scholars in general. These two books provide insight and detail about the life of North Carolina’s best-known playwright as well as his most written about play.
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