Shirley Ann Grau
Grau in 1965
Born	(1929-07-08)July 8, 1929 New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S.
Died	August 3, 2020(2020-08-03) (aged 91) Kenner, Louisiana, U.S.
Occupation	Writer
Education	Tulane University (BA)
Years active	1955–2006
Notable works	The Keepers of the House
Notable awards	Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 1965
Spouse	James Feibleman ​ ​ (m. 1955; died 1987)​
Children	4

Shirley Ann Grau (July 8, 1929 – August 3, 2020) was an American writer. Born inNew Orleans,^[1] she lived part of her childhood inMontgomery, Alabama. Her novels are set primarily in theDeep South^[1] and explore issues of race and gender. In 1965 she won thePulitzer Prize for Literature for her novelThe Keepers of the House, set in a fictional Alabama town.

Grau was born inNew Orleans, Louisiana, on July 8, 1929. Her father was a dentist; her mother was a housewife.^[2] She grew up in and aroundMontgomery andSelma, Alabama, with her mother.^[3] She graduated in 1950Phi Beta Kappa^{[citation needed]} with aB.A. degree fromNewcomb College, the women's coordinate college ofTulane University.^[4]

Grau's first collection of storiesThe Black Prince was nominated for theNational Book Award in 1956.^[5] Nine years later, her novelThe Keepers of the House was awarded the 1965Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.^[6][7] It deals with aninterracial marriage that was illegal, and the implications of the mixed-race children laterpassing as white.

The morning she was called about the Pulitzer Prize, she thought it was a practical joke from a friend whose voice she thought she recognized."'I was awfully short-tempered that morning because I'd been up all night with one of my children,' Grau said ... 'So, I said to the voice I mistook, "yeah and I'm the Queen of England too," and I hung up on him.'" The Pulitzer Prize committee member did not give up and called her publisherAlfred A. Knopf. "The news got to me, but that was very embarrassing."^[8]

Grau's writing explores issues of death, destruction,abortion, andmiscegenation, frequently set in historical Alabama^[9] or Louisiana. Although she did not restrict her writing to theDeep South or stories about women, she is recognized as an important writer in the fields ofwomen's studies,feminist literature, andSouthern literature.^[10]

In 1955 Grau marriedJames Feibleman, a fellow writer and a professor of philosophy at Tulane University. The pair were introduced by Grau's friend, a student of Feibleman. She legally changed her surname to his but retained her maiden name when writing. Together, they had four children—two sons (Ian and William) and two daughters (Nora and Katherine). The family settled inMetairie, on the outskirts of New Orleans. They were still married when he died in 1987. Grau died on August 3, 2020, at aretirement home inKenner, Louisiana. She was 91 and had suffered from complications of a stroke.^[2][5]

• The Black Prince, and Other Stories (short stories; 1955)ISBN 978-0394417066^[4]
• The Hard Blue Sky (1958)ISBN 978-0807126905^[4]
• The House on Coliseum Street (1961)ISBN 978-0807121016^[4]
• The Keepers of the House (1964)ISBN 978-1400030743^[4]
• The Condor Passes (1971)ISBN 978-1412812504^[4]
• The Wind Shifting West (short stories; 1973)ISBN 978-0394488905^[4]
• Evidence of Love (1977)ISBN 978-0394411156^[4]
• Nine Women (short stories; 1986)ISBN 978-0394548456^[4]
• Roadwalkers (1994)ISBN 978-0679432333^[4]
• Selected Stories (2006)ISBN 9780807128831^[11]

• 1929 births
• 2020 deaths
• 20th-century American novelists
• 20th-century American women writers
• 21st-century American novelists
• 21st-century American women writers
• American women novelists
• Novelists from Louisiana
• Pulitzer Prize for Fiction winners
• Tulane University alumni
• Writers from New Orleans

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• Articles with dead external links from February 2019
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