Eudora Welty 's importance lies in the fact that during the past four decades she has produced an original and enduring body of fiction. Independent of any specific literary group, clear even of the influence of her most illustrious fellow Mississippian, William Faulkner, she stands preeminent among living writers of the Southern Renascence, and high, indeed, among all living American writers of fiction. Her best work is as difficult to describe or "place" as it is remarkable and secure in its excellence. If there is any key to her importance, it exists in the faithful exercise of a creative imagination which sees, hears, and celebrates the myriad life of humankind, suffers through a dilemma, probes a mystery, and fuses inner and outer reality, transmuting it into the language and forms of fiction. Her works are mostly short stories or novellas, though two are novels, one long (Losing Battles...