Jordan is So Chilly

To mark the 70th anniversary of the publication of "Strange Fruit," Lillian Smith's best-selling novel about interracial love, the Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries presents "Jordan is So Chilly: An Encounter with Lillian Smith," a solo performance drawn largely from unpublished autobiographical writings by the author.

The performance title "Jordan is So Chilly," comes from the name of an African-American spiritual and was Smith's original title for "Strange Fruit."

"The title calls up for me the image of the difficult times faced by anyone in crossing over to the ‘promised land'," [Atlanta actress Brenda] Bynum said. "Lillian Smith faced so many trials and tribulations in her life and her work it seemed quite appropriate to me."

Nancy Smith Fichter, the author's niece, approached Bynum about doing a reading, perhaps from Smith's published letters, as an event at the Lillian E. Smith Center for Creative Arts in connection with the 2013 Southern Literary Trail.

...

"No Southerner was more outspoken in expressing moral indignation about the region's injustices and inequities during the pre-civil rights era than Lillian Smith," said UGA history professor John Inscoe, an expert on the 19th century South and winner of the 2012 Lillian Smith Book Award, presented by the UGA Libraries and the Southern Regional Council.

The event, which is free and open to the public, is on Saturday Feb. 22 at 6 p.m.