1 of 4
Author Crystal Wilkinson and her partner, artist Ron Davis. Photo by Sarah Jane Sanders
2 of 4
Wilkinson and Davis relocated their bookstore, Wild Figs Books and Coffee, to North Limestone Street in 2015. Photo by Sarah Jane Sanders
3 of 4
Wild Figs Books and Coffee located on North Limestone Street. Photo by Sarah Jane Sanders
4 of 4
Wild Figs Books and Coffee located on North Limestone Street. Photo by Sarah Jane Sanders
From her upbringing in a bucolic Eastern Kentucky community to winning the prestigious national Ernest J. Gaines Award last year, Crystal Wilkinson’s rise to literary acclaim has been fostered by her Kentucky surroundings.
Growing up on her grandparents’ Casey County farm, the medium of storytelling was ingrained in Wilkinson from an early age. Her earliest influence came from hearing each of her relatives refine their own stash of stories over time.
“My grandmother was eighth-grade educated, my grandfather was third-grade educated, but they are among the wisest people I have ever known, even to this day,” Wilkinson said. “Part of that wisdom came through the passing down of stories. There were a lot of stories that were on repeat in our household.”
With her grandmother reading to her every night during her earliest years, Wilkinson started reading on her own even before she was old enough to attend school. Once she had read every story in the house, she began writing her own. She continued to write fiction into her teenage years while also contributing to the Casey County High School newspaper and excelling in visual art.
Journalism seemed like a natural course of study when she attended Eastern Kentucky University, but deep down she knew that non-fiction wasn’t quite the right fit.
“I was so shy that I couldn’t bring myself to do the first assigned interview for my journalism class,” Wilkinson said with a smile. “I made it all up and got an A, but then confessed that I made it up, and the grade was changed to an F.”
Wilkinson ultimately completed her journalism degree, but with her mind made up: Her heart belonged to fiction. Following graduation, she held a variety of writing-related jobs around Lexington (including positions with the Lexington Herald-Leader and the Carnegie Center), using nearly every free moment to craft short stories and poems.
Wilkinson published her first collection of stories, titled “Blackberries, Blackberries,” in 2000. She returned to school, earning an Masters of Fine Arts from Spalding University, and published her thesis as her second book, “Water Street,” a collection of stories centering on a group of complex, interrelated neighbors in a small Kentucky town. (Both titles are being reissued by the University of Kentucky Press this month.)
Wilkinson’s third book and first novel, “Birds of Opulence” was published in 2016 and took nearly a decade to write. Set in the fictional town of Opulence, Kentucky, the book centers on several generations of two different families and how they deal with mental illness.
“It’s about love and loss,” Wilkinson explained. “It’s about roots in Appalachia – what it means to be a part of a family that has been in a place for several generations.”
Like Wendell Berry’s Port William and William Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha County, Opulence is meant to capture the spirit of where Wilkinson was raised.
“My literary imagination will always live in Appalachia,” Wilkinson said. “I think Opulence captures the spirit of the place where I grew up. My grandfather was a tobacco farmer. It’s Appalachia, but it’s not coal mining Appalachia. It’s the agrarian part, the rural life.”
The book received the 2016 Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence, a national award with a cash prize given to an emerging black fiction writer each year. The Louisiana-based prize was Wilkinson’s first national award.
“It was really exciting,” she said. “I was in the car driving back from a speaking engagement in Pennsylvania when they called. I thought it was a friend of mine since it was a New Orleans telephone number so I was acting really casual and said ‘Hey, What’s up?’ Then they told me I had won, and I just reverted back to the 12-year-old me that had wanted to be a writer... I was squealing like a 12-year-old. To get to go down there and meet Mr. Gaines – it was all pretty fabulous.”
Her creativity might be rooted in the Appalachian foothills, but Wilkinson acknowledged that Lexington’s environment or artistic support has been instrumental in her success. She points to local artists’ acceptance of one another as a key component to the city’s growing reputation as a writing destination.
“We make room for all types of writers to co-exist here, whether they are self-publishing or with one of the big houses,” she said. “There isn’t that sort of clique-ish feel. I think we’re all pretty open to helping each other and pointing people in the right direction.
“That sort of support makes us all stronger and makes new people coming in stronger too,” she said. “Plus, we have a lot of great independent book stores.”
One such book store is Wild Fig Books and Coffee, a shop/café/workspace that Wilkinson and her partner, artist Ron Davis, opened the second iteration of on North Limestone in 2015. Named for a poem by native Kentucky author Gayl Jones, who was inducted into the Kentucky Literary Hall of Fame earlier this year, Wild Fig hosts discussions, open mics and book signings for local authors. The café also serves local baked goods and smoothies with names like “The Wendell Berry.”
As a business owner, professor and grandmother, Wilkinson’s writing routine is always subject to change. Her best writing occurs about 3 a.m., she says, but with a full schedule she abides by a “get in where you fit in” credo. She sometimes writes at her shop and has favorite spots in libraries around the state where she likes to write, but ultimately says her flow streamlines in the unlikeliest of places.
“I like to work in garages while my car is being worked on,” Wilkinson chuckled. “I think that is also connected to childhood. I hung out with my grandfather a lot, and he liked to hang out at the gas station, even when he didn’t have a car there. He just hung out. So that smell of the oil and the gas is nostalgic for me.”