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==Biography==
==Biography==
===Early life===
===Early life===
Phillips was born on October 11, 1922 on a farm between [[Corinth, Mississippi|Corinth]] and [[Kossuth, Mississippi|Kossuth]] in [[Alcorn County, Mississippi|Alcorn County]], northeastern [[Mississippi]].<ref name="mwm">{{cite web |url=http://www.mswritersandmusicians.com/writers/thomas-phillips.html |title=Thomas Hal Phillips |publisher=Mississippi Writers and Musicians |accessdate=August 14, 2017}}</ref><ref name="stuart"/> He was one of five sons and a daughter born to William Thomas Phillips, a farmer of English descent, and Ollie Fare Phillips, a schoolteacher with Scottish and Irish ancestry. The family moved in the 1940s to Kossuth so that the children might gain a better education.<ref name="stuart"/><ref name="lloyd">{{cite book |title=Lives of Mississippi Authors, 1817-1967 |first=James B. |last=Lloyd |publisher=University Press of Mississippi |year=1981 |isbn=978-1-61703-418-3 |page=370 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=RfXGJBB1HvoC&pg=PA370}}</ref> After schooling in Kossuth, Phillips attended [[Hinds Community College|Hinds Junior College]].<ref name="touring">{{cite book |title=Touring Literary Mississippi |first1=Patti Carr |last1=Black |first2=Marion |last2=Barnwell |publisher=University Press of Mississippi |year=2002 |isbn=978-1-57806-367-3 |pages=194-197 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=EVLjDK5othUC&pg=PA194}}</ref>
Phillips was born on October 11, 1922 on a farm between [[Corinth, Mississippi|Corinth]] and [[Kossuth, Mississippi|Kossuth]] in [[Alcorn County, Mississippi|Alcorn County]], northeastern [[Mississippi]].<ref name="mwm">{{cite web |url=http://www.mswritersandmusicians.com/writers/thomas-phillips.html |title=Thomas Hal Phillips |publisher=Mississippi Writers and Musicians |accessdate=August 14, 2017}}</ref><ref name="stuart"/> He was one of five sons and a daughter born to William Thomas Phillips, a farmer of English descent, and Ollie Fare Phillips, a schoolteacher with Scottish and Irish ancestry. The family moved in the 1940s to Kossuth so that the children might gain a better education.<ref name="stuart"/><ref name="lloyd">{{cite book |title=Lives of Mississippi Authors, 1817-1967 |first=James B. |last=Lloyd |publisher=University Press of Mississippi |year=1981 |isbn=978-1-61703-418-3 |pages=370-372 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=RfXGJBB1HvoC&pg=PA370}}</ref> After schooling in Kossuth, Phillips attended [[Hinds Community College|Hinds Junior College]].<ref name="touring">{{cite book |title=Touring Literary Mississippi |first1=Patti Carr |last1=Black |first2=Marion |last2=Barnwell |publisher=University Press of Mississippi |year=2002 |isbn=978-1-57806-367-3 |pages=194-197 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=EVLjDK5othUC&pg=PA194}}</ref>


Phillips served in the [[United States Navy]] in the [[Mediterranean]] during [[World War II]], after obtaining a degree in social science from [[Mississippi State University]] in 1943.<ref name="southernwriters">{{cite book |title=Southern Writers: A New Biographical Dictionary |editor1-first=Joseph M. |editor1-last=Flora |editor2-first=Amber |editor2-last=Vogel |page=316 |publisher=LSU Press |year=2006 |isbn=978-0-80713-123-7 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=xxd451POnpYC&pg=PA316}}</ref> He then used the [[G.I. Bill]] to finance a [[master's degree]] in writing at the [[University of Alabama]], which resulted in a thesis that later became his first novel, ''The Bitterweed Path''.<ref name="stuart"/> His adviser was [[Hudson Strode]] and the thesis won Phillips a [[Rosenwald Fund|Julius Rosenwald Fellowship]] in 1947 and the [[Eugene F. Saxton Award]] in 1948.<ref name="southernwriters"/>
Phillips served in the [[United States Navy]] in the [[Mediterranean]] during [[World War II]], after obtaining a degree in social science from [[Mississippi State University]] in 1943.<ref name="southernwriters">{{cite book |title=Southern Writers: A New Biographical Dictionary |editor1-first=Joseph M. |editor1-last=Flora |editor2-first=Amber |editor2-last=Vogel |page=316 |publisher=LSU Press |year=2006 |isbn=978-0-80713-123-7 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=xxd451POnpYC&pg=PA316}}</ref> He then used the [[G.I. Bill]] to finance a [[master's degree]] in writing at the [[University of Alabama]], which resulted in a thesis that later became his first novel, ''The Bitterweed Path''.<ref name="stuart"/> His adviser was [[Hudson Strode]] and the thesis won Phillips a [[Rosenwald Fund|Julius Rosenwald Fellowship]] in 1947 and the [[Eugene F. Saxton Award]] in 1948.<ref name="southernwriters"/>
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==Short stories==
==Short stories==
*"A Touch of Earth", published in the ''[[Southwest Review]]'' of 1949 and subsequently in the ''Best American Short Stories of 1949'' collection<ref name="lloyd"/>
*"Lone Bridge"
⚫
*"The Shadow of an Arm", published in the ''[[Virginia Quarterly Review]]'', 1950, was a winner in the 1951 [[O. Henry Award]]s<ref name="lloyd"/>
*"Mostly in the Fields"
*"Lone Bridge", published in the ''[[Southwest Review]]'' of 1951 and subsequently in the ''Best American Short Stories of 1949'' collection<ref name="lloyd"/>
⚫
*"The Shadow of an Arm", which won the [[O. Henry Award]]<ref name="missenc"/>
*"Mostly in the Fields", published in the ''[[Virginia Quarterly Review]]'', 1951 and subsequently used as a part of ''Search for a Hero''<ref name="lloyd"/>
*"A Touch of Earth"


==References==
==References==

Revision as of 19:03, 14 August 2017

For other people named Thomas Phillips, see Thomas Phillips (disambiguation).

Thomas Hal Phillips (October 11, 1922 – April 3, 2007) was an American novelist, actor and screenwriter.

Biography

Early life

Phillips was born on October 11, 1922 on a farm between Corinth and Kossuth in Alcorn County, northeastern Mississippi.[1][2] He was one of five sons and a daughter born to William Thomas Phillips, a farmer of English descent, and Ollie Fare Phillips, a schoolteacher with Scottish and Irish ancestry. The family moved in the 1940s to Kossuth so that the children might gain a better education.[2][3] After schooling in Kossuth, Phillips attended Hinds Junior College.[4]

Phillips served in the United States Navy in the Mediterranean during World War II, after obtaining a degree in social science from Mississippi State University in 1943.[5] He then used the G.I. Bill to finance a master's degree in writing at the University of Alabama, which resulted in a thesis that later became his first novel, The Bitterweed Path.[2] His adviser was Hudson Strode and the thesis won Phillips a Julius Rosenwald Fellowship in 1947 and the Eugene F. Saxton Award in 1948.[5]

Upon completion of his degree in 1948, Phillips taught for two years at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. He was able to study in France in 1950 when he was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship.[3][5]

Writing

Phillips's first novel - The Bitterweed Path - was a bestseller[citation needed] in its first paperback edition from Penguin Press. The novel was first published in an almost underground way, as a very small, limited run in hardback in 1950 by Rinehart & Co., Inc., and advertised, at the time, as "something new in the literature dealing with man's love for man ... in a period when even psychologists knew little of such matters, and people in small towns new nothing."[citation needed] The book depicts the struggles of two gay men in the Southern United States at the turn of the 20th century, and how an unconventional love triangle involving these two men, and one of their fathers, impacts their three marriages in small-town, Deep South. The book's theme was notable in an era of repression, and even more so for coming from a particularly repressive state.[6][7]

Phillips, for whom Corinth-based writer Henry Dalton was a mentor,[4] was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for work in fiction in 1953 and again in 1956.[8] His next four books, including another - Kangaroo Hollow - that had a queer theme, were less successful than the first, even though they were well-received by literary critics.[7] These literary efforts had been in part subsidised by his investment in his brother Frank's trucking business.[2] By the late 1950s, he had given up writing novels[7] and did not return to the field until 2002, when Red Midnight was published.[6]

Politics

Around 1958-1960,[a] Phillips was appointed to the Mississippi Public Service Commission to fill the vacancy created by the resignation of his younger brother, attorney Rubel Phillips. He resigned that post in 1963 so that he could help Rubel in what proved to be an unsuccessful Republican gubernatorial campaign.[4] According to Courtney Chartier, Thomas Phillips managed that campaign and another unsuccessful attempt by Rubel in 1967.[6] However, Jan Stuart says that Thomas wrote speeches and literature for Rubel but was himself a "dyed-in-the-wool" Democrat:

To the young Tom, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was God. He would later admire, if not exalt, JFK, Jimmy Carter and, despite the blotch of scandal and impeachment, William Jefferson Clinton.[2]

Film and later life

The film rights to Phillips's 1955 novel The Loved and the Unloved were sold[4] and in the 1960s, he began working with Hollywood director Robert Altman. He contributed in various capacities to films such as Thieves Like Us (1974, associate producer)[9] and The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, as well as to Nashville, a movie in which he also played an off-screen character.[1][10] He was a consultant for Ode to Billy Joe in 1976, when he was the first chairman of the Mississippi Film Commission.[7]

Phillips, who did not marry,[7] spent much of his post-military life living alternately between California and Corinth, where he usually resided at the Phillips Brothers Truck Stop that he and Frank had opened in 1960.[4] He died on April 3, 2007 in Kossuth, aged 84.[6]

Books

Phillips wrote six novels:[6]

  • The Bitterweed Path (1950)
  • The Golden Lie (1951)
  • Search for a Hero (1952)
  • Kangaroo Hollow (1954), published only in the UK until 2000
  • The Loved and the Unloved (1955)
  • Red Midnight (2002)

Movies

  • Walking Tall II
  • Tarzan's Fight for Life (1958)
  • Huckleberry Finn
  • Minstrel Man
  • California Split
  • Buffalo Bill and the Indians
  • Thieves Like Us' (1974; associate producer)
  • Nashville (1975; consultant and voice actor)[9]
  • Ode to Billy Joe (1976; consultant)
  • Nightmare in Badham County (1976; actor)[9]
  • The Brain Machine (1977; writer, producer and actor)[9]
  • Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry (1978; screenwriter and actor)[9][11]
  • Barn Burning (1980; actor)[9]
  • O. C. and Stiggs(1987; actor)[9]
  • Matewan (1987; actor)[9]
  • Cookie's Fortune

Phillips's acting roles were often minor parts.[9]

Short stories

References

Notes

  1. ^ Sources give different years fpr his appointment to the Mississippi Public Service Commission.[3][4][6]

Citations

  1. ^ a b "Thomas Hal Phillips". Mississippi Writers and Musicians. Retrieved August 14, 2017.
  2. ^ a b c d e Stuart, Jan (2003). The Nashville Chronicles: The Making of Robert Altman's Masterpiece. Hal Leonard Corporation. pp. 68–70. ISBN 978-0-87910-981-3.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g Lloyd, James B. (1981). Lives of Mississippi Authors, 1817-1967. University Press of Mississippi. pp. 370–372. ISBN 978-1-61703-418-3.
  4. ^ a b c d e f Black, Patti Carr; Barnwell, Marion (2002). Touring Literary Mississippi. University Press of Mississippi. pp. 194–197. ISBN 978-1-57806-367-3.
  5. ^ a b c Flora, Joseph M.; Vogel, Amber, eds. (2006). Southern Writers: A New Biographical Dictionary. LSU Press. p. 316. ISBN 978-0-80713-123-7.
  6. ^ a b c d e f Chartier, Courtney (2017). "Phillips, Thomas Hal". In Ownby, Ted; Wilson, Charles Reagan; Abadie, Ann J.; Lindsey, Odie; Thomas, James G. (eds.). The Mississippi Encyclopedia. University Press of Mississippi. p. 993. ISBN 978-1-49681-159-2.
  7. ^ a b c d e Howard, John (2001). Men Like That: A Southern Queer History (Reprinted, revised ed.). University of Chicago Press. pp. 188–191. ISBN 978-0-22635-470-5.
  8. ^ "Thomas Hal Phillips". John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Retrieved August 14, 2017.
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i Lentz III, Harris M. (2008). Obituaries in the Performing Arts, 2007: Film, Television, Radio, Theatre, Dance, Music, Cartoons and Pop Culture. McFarland. p. 289. ISBN 978-0-78643-481-7.
  10. ^ "Novelist, screenwriter Phillips dies at 84". wmctv.com. Associated Press. September 27, 2007. Archived from the original on September 27, 2007.
  11. ^ Black, Patti Carr; Barnwell, Marion (2002). Touring Literary Mississippi. University Press of Mississippi. p. 92. ISBN 978-1-57806-367-3.
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