Respected as a poet, storyteller, critic, and influential English professor at Hollins University in Virginia, R. H. W. Dillard has enjoyed a substantial and varied writing career. Author of a growing body of work that includes short and long fiction, literary scholarship, poetry, and screenplays, Dillard has been hailed by fellow writer George Garrett as a master of "new Southern Fiction." For his influence on generations of students, Garrett Epps of The New York Times (7 August 1988) categorizes him as "one of the most remarkable teachers in America."

Born in Roanoke, Virginia, on 11 October 1937, Richard Henry Wilde Dillard was named after his great grandfather. The Dillard family had arrived in the New World in the 1650s and had distinguished themselves as doctors, lawyers, and military officers throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. His father, Benton Dillard, was an attorney and elected mayor (Democrat) of Roanoke, Virginia. He describes his...