For almost thirty-five years her stories and novels about the lives of Mississippians have captured the authentic tone of her native region with compassion and with acute insight. She has written of despair and exhilaration, of youth and age, of families and of those isolated from community, with the mixture of the comic and tragic that dramatizes the truths of the human condition. She has perfected the techniques of her artistic predecessors, and extended the scope of American writing in both theme and craft, until her books now stand as classics. Her wit, her sure knowledge of humanity, her profound moral sense and judgment, and above all her love and forgiveness for the variety of human potentialities and weaknesses, have taken her to the highest position in contemporary American literature. In recognition of her distinction and the promise of achievements to follow, we are pleased to confer upon her this day the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa.