SOURCE: Lanier, Doris. “Mary Noailles Murfree: An Interview.” Tennessee Historical Quarterly 31 (1972): 276-78.

In the following essay, Lanier presents an edited version of an 1885 newspaper interview with Murfree.

While working on her novel The Prophet of the Great Smoky Mountains,¹ Mary Noailles Murfree spent about two months at Montvale Springs, a mountain resort in Blount County, in East Tennessee, studying the mountaineers of the surrounding area.² On November 15, 1885, an article appeared in a Macon, Georgia, newspaper, which concerned an interview with Joseph A. Farrell,³ who spent three weeks at Montvale while Miss Murfree was there. The interview gives an intimate glimpse of the writer at work, and makes some interesting comments on Miss Murfree's personal characteristics, work habits, and methods of study. The article in its entirety is as follows:⁴

Mr. Joseph A. Farrell arrived in Atlanta a few days ago from Montvale Springs, Tennessee, where he has been...