Cross Creek is a 1942 memoir by American author Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings. A work of creative nonfiction, it comprises a series of sketches based on Rawlings' life and that of her neighbors in the small rural community of Cross Creek, Florida. Cross Creek has been critically well received since its publication, and remains Rawlings' second best known work after her 1938 novel The Yearling.
Contents Cross Creek begins with a description of the town and wilderness when Rawlings first arrived. It contains a series of vignettes about different people and events that Rawlings had gotten to know during her time there. Notable sketches include those describing Beatrice, also known as 'Geechee, a Gullah-Geechee worker Rawlings hired as a housekeeper until her alcoholism and self-destructive behavior cause a break, and detail Rawlings' experience helping her "profane friend" Zelma collect data for the 1930 United States census.
Background Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings had moved to the community of Cross Creek, Florida, in 1928 after purchasing an orange grove with an inheritance from her mother. Rawlings and her husband Chuck had been living in Rochester, New York, where they wrote for the local newspapers. Marjorie's column, Songs of a Housewife, was canceled in February, after which the Rawlingses traveled to Florida to visit Chuck's brothers. Falling in love with the state, and dissatisfied with their lives and careers in Rochester, the couple decided to move. Using a small inheritance from her mother, Rawlings purchased a farm and orange grove in Cross Creek sight unseen.McCutchan, pp. 87-89
The rural environment of North Central Florida and its Florida cracker inhabitants inspired Rawlings' subsequent writing. She shifted from her previous newspaper column work into literary writing with short stories including "Cracker Chidlings" and "Jacob's Ladder".McCutchan, p. 99, 102. The success of her short stories and the encouragement of editor Maxwell Perkins led to her first novel, South Moon Under, published in 1933.McCutchan, p. 106
Rawlings had hoped to write a book-length work of creative nonfiction as early as 1935, after the publication of her second novel, Golden Apples. She envisioned combining existing and new vignettes as Cross Creek: A Chronicle.McCutchan, p. 147. However, she tabled the project to work on what became her best known novel, The Yearling, published to great fanfare and success in 1938.McCutchan, pp. 147-149. Cross Creek remained Rawlings' "chief obsession", and she continued working on it while preparing her first short story collection, When the Whippoorwill, published in 1940.McCutchan, p. 193.
Notes
References McCuthan, Anne (2021). The Life She Wished to Live: A Biography of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, Author of The Yearling. W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 0393353494.