The 1981 publication of The Stories of Elizabeth Spencer precipitated a remarkable change in Elizabeth Spencer's literary reputation. Before that time she had published only one collection of stories, Ship Island and Other Stories (1968), and the last two of her seven novels, No Place for an Angel (1967) and The Snare (1972), had received insensitive and often unfavorable reviews. The thirty-three works of short fiction in The Stories allowed readers to consider a large and important body of work. Because she arranged the stories in the order in which they were written, this book traces Spencer's artistic evolution and captures her major themes. Critics were forced to regard her as an important short-story writer, and reviewers, including poet James Dickey and fiction writer Reynolds Price, lavished praise on the collection. In 1983 Spencer received the Award of Merit Medal for the Short Story from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and...