American Writers' Personalities as Modern Cars

“What would you be if you were a car?” My father and I came up with this idea a few weeks ago.

While I have a hard time fitting myself into stereotypes, I think it would be fun to place the “personality” of today’s cars and associate them with famous American writers of the 19^th and 20^th centuries.

Flannery O’Connor—2015 Chevrolet SS

            One of the great American writers of Southern “grotesque,” O’Connor was known for writing stories that could be sometimes quite frightening, or appear to be timid at first and then shock the hell out of you. For a literary example, read “Good Country People.” The Chevy SS appears to be something like that—kind of average-looking sedan until you press the ignition button and drive the car onto a busy highway. Watch the smoke from the rear wheels appear into a cloud, then a mushroom cloud, and feel your heart speed until a stop while the fear of an overpowered sedan overtakes you.

Mark Twain—Bentley Flying Spur or 2015 Cadillac CTS

            Twain was not poor by any means, and it is understood that he enjoyed the wealth that he built from his traveling lectures. I had a hard time picking either a luxurious Bentley sedan or Cadillac’s newest car, the CTS. I suppose it could vary depending on how patriotic Twain was feeling, but with his money he would enjoy fine motoring in some sort of luxury.

T.S. Eliot—2002-05 Jaguar X-type

            Eliot and his poetic colleague, Ezra Pound, were born in America but hated living here. Eliot eventually took up British citizenship, which is why he is associated here with the Ford-made Jaguar X-type. Sold only for a few years in the States, the car was probably much less popular than his poetry about 100 years earlier.

F. Scott Fitzgerald—the President’s Cadillac limousine (unknown year)

            Scott Fitzgerald may ring a bell in many Americans who at least received a B in their high school English class. That’s because he is famously associated with the Jazz age, his tremendous if short-lived wealth, and his extraordinary income from his literature, such as “The Great Gatsby.” I figured why not pick the President’s very own limousine.

Tennessee Williams—1966 Shelby Cobra 427

            Although this is meant to associate authors with modern cars, I could not think of a car that was more associated with excess and drama than the king of American cars itself, the Shelby Cobra. Equipped with a mean 425 horsepower engine, the car could rocket to high acceleration numbers faster than anything else with plenty of noise, drama, and boys staring at it as it drove by. Williams was a purveyor of stories but also of drama, with his “A Streetcar Named Desire” hitting audiences in the 1950s. His critics complained of excess drama and sex in the play, as well as other literature he composed.