(1917 – 1967) Born in Georgia, and later a close friend of Tennessee Williams, McCullers is considered an heir to the Southern Gothic tradition of William Faulkner. An essayist and poet, she is primarily known for her allegorical fiction, which explores the feminine aspects of spiritual isolation in the South of the mid-twentieth century She published The Heart is a Lonely Hunter (1940) at age twenty-three, following that with several wellreceived novels and a successful stage adaptation of her novel The Member of the Wedding (1946). McCullers battled a series of strokes and serious illnesses as well as personal tragedies throughout her adult life.