Dim and Untouchable Things: Sir Arthur Eddington's The Nature of the Physical World in Drafts of Eudora Welty's "The Burning"

Abstract: This article examines early drafts of Eudora Welty's short story "The Burning" through the lens of Sir Arthur Eddington's treatise The Nature of the Physical World . Focusing on "The Ghosts" and a later iteration of the story published in Harper's Bazaar , the essay argues that Welty employs Eddingtonian ideas on reality, materiality, and illusion to question the antebellum South's dependence on possession, memory, and racial supremacy. Welty's use of ephemeral diction and hallucinatory themes in these drafts, drawing on Eddington's assertion that the "stuff" of the world is but "mindstuff," interrogates white characters and their reliance on both material wealth and the illusion of white supremacy, showcasing how her non-white characters perceive "truer" truths separate from the narratives of the white South. Ultimately, the essay contends that Welty employs symbols, such as the gold mirror, to mediate between the tangible and intangible, revealing alternative truths and challenging the foundations of the South's inherited narrative of racial hierarchy.