The Ponder heart

Uncle Daniel Ponder, whose fortune is exceeded only by his desire to give it away, is a source of vexation for his niece, Edna Earle. Uncle Daniel’s trial for the alleged murder of his seventeen-year-old bride is a comic masterpiece. Awarded the William Dean Howells Medal of the american Academy of Arts and Letters. Drawings by Joe Krush. A comic work of fiction about a small-town Southerner who had a penchant for giving things away. “ A wonderful tragicomedy” of a Mississippi family, a vast inheritance, and an impulsive heir, by the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Delta Wedding ( The New York Times ). Daniel Ponder is the amiable heir to the wealthiest family in Clay County, Mississippi. To friends and strangers, he’s also the most generous, having given away heirlooms, a watch, and so far, at least one family business. His niece, Edna Earle, has a solution to save the Ponder fortune from Daniel’s mortifying philanthropy: As much as she loves Daniel, she’s decided to have him institutionalized. Foolproof as the plan may seem, it comes with a kink—one that sets in motion a runaway scheme of mistaken identity, a hapless local widow, a reckless wedding, a dim-witted teenage bride, and a twist of dumb luck that lands this once-respectable Southern family in court to brave an embarrassing trial for murder. It’s become the talk of Clay County. And the loose-tongued Edna Earle will tell you all about it. “The most revered figure in contemporary American letters,” said the New York Times of Eudora Welty, which also hailed The Ponder Heart —a winner of the William Dean Howells Medal which was adapted into both a Broadway play and a PBS Masterpiece series—as “Miss Welty at her comic, compassionate best.” Uncle Daniel Ponder, whose fortune is exceeded by his desire to give it away, is the talk of Clay County and a source of vexation for his niece, Edna Earle, whose determined efforts to thwart his generosity prove inadequate to his ingenuity. Bonnie Dee Peacock, the little girl from the country who becomes his second wife in order that he may have someone close by to whom he can give things, is not so small that her disappearance goes unnoticed. Uncle Daniel's trial for the alleged murder of his seventeen-year-old bride is a comic masterpiece that climaxes one of Eudora's Welty's happiest stories and vindicates one of her most brilliant characters. -- Back cover Uncle Daniel Ponder, whose fortune is exceeded only by his desire to give it away, is a source of vexation for his niece, Edna Earle. Uncle Daniel's trial for the alleged murder of his seventeen-year-old bride is a comic masterpiece. --Publisher Edna Earle Ponder, who runs a hotel in a small Mississippi town, tells the story of her beloved, softhearted, but trying Uncle Daniel.