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The Ponder Heart

Check out ExxonMobil Masterpiece Theatre's American Collection website at pbs.org for additional teacher information

Premiered on PBS October 2001

The Ponder Heart, based on the novel by Eudora Welty, airs on EXXONMOBIL MASTERPIECE THEATRE'S AMERICAN COLLECTION.

Follow the links to learn more about The Ponder Heart, Eudora Welty, and related resources.

"I can [get into the skin of characters] where I know everybody, or the kind of person it is, or the kind of place."
– Eudora Welty (Prenshaw 132)

Introduction One:   Introduction to Eudora Welty.

Introduction Two:   Introduction to Edna Earle Ponder.

Author Links:   Teacher evaluated websites on Welty and The Ponder Heart.

Image Gallery: View photographs from the film version of The Ponder Heart.

Teacher Resources/Lesson Plans:   Essays and Lesson Plans  focusing on Welty and/or The Ponder Heart.

Online Teacher's Guide:   A useful tools to organize the resources on the site for teaching the film and novel.

Teacher Review:   Georgia high school teacher Barbara Lipe reviews the PBS film.

Pulitzer Prize winner Eudora Welty passed away Monday, July 24, 2001 in her home town of Jackson, Mississippi.

Born in 1909, Welty was a distinctively Southern literary voice for more than sixty years. Her first published short story appeared in print in 1936 and she went on to create a collection of stories, novels, and novellas that established her in the first rank of 20th century American writers.

In its report on Welty's death, CNN quoted writer Elizabeth Hardwick as saying, "She was extraordinary. She had her own voice and her own tone and her own subject matter. There was no one quite like her in American literature."

Welty's best-known works include Delta Wedding, Losing Battles, The Golden Apples, and The Ponder Heart (1954). She was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1973 for the novel The Optimist's Daughter.

The film production of The Ponder Heart aired October 15, 2001 on ExxonMobil Masterpiece Theatre's American Collection.