Julie Harris: He Is Arisen




"Tenn had purchased a gift for Julie in the French Quarter. In a voodoo shop, he passed up a number of amulets, skulls, animal skins, beads, and candles to find a tiny and lovely photograph of a dark-skinned girl encased in bright material. It was clearly handmade, and Tenn asked the proprietor about its provenance. 'It's from Milagro,' he was told. 'What does that mean?' Tenn asked. 'It means it's powerful,' was the response, so Tenn bought it for Julie, and I held it for almost nine years before giving it to her.

"She wept and told me that she had recently attended church services for the Easter season. 'In one church,' she remembered, 'the cross had been made bare, the Christ figure removed. This was not a time for sadness, for he had arisen and was in his place. He will be back on that cross in time, of course, for us to look upon and grimace and love and try to understand, but for now he's away and all is well. I look at this,' she said, looking down at the icon, 'and I know that Tennessee Williams is dead, and I know that this is devastating to me, but he's on no cross at all--he is arisen, and he arises every time a play of his is read in a bedroom or a classroom or a library; every time it is produced in a basement or a high school or a theater. They can't hurt my friend anymore. He's gone from all of this."--Julie Harris/From Follies of God: Tennessee Williams​ and the Women of the Fog  by James Grissom (Alfred A. Knopf​ )

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