Katherine Anne Porter was born Callie Russell Porter in Indian Creek, Texas, on May 15, 1890. As with her pen name, Porter frequently embellished, exaggerated, or entirely fabricated biographical facts, so the precise truth of her life story remains uncertain. She took her name from her paternal grandmother, Catherine Anne Porter; Porter's grandmother cared for her son Harry's family at her Texas home following the death of Porter's mother. Some critics have observed similarities between Porter's life and the life of Miranda, the principal character in "The Grave." Thomas F. Walsh suggests that the story is influenced by how "Porter's own father had created in her the desperate need to cling to the innocence he ironically had denied her by plunging her into early guilt over her mother's death."

Porter's writing career began in journalism, and she worked in Denver, New York, and Mexico—the latter often...