Mason is among the first to use seriously the so-called low art of popular culture as an important underpinning to her literature and the lives of her characters. While she portrays the encroaching impact of urban America on her rural occupants--Wal-Mart replaces the country store, fast food substitutes for traditional home cooking--she usually does so not as a criticism but as a means of providing an accurate and realistic depiction of the people within their changing environments. Her inclusion of these popular elements enhances the sense of meeting real people engaged in their everyday lives.
Bobbie Ann Mason was born on 1 May 1940, in Mayfield, Kentucky, the first of Wilburn Arnett and Christianna Lee Mason's four children, three daughters and one son. The family farm was located just far enough outside Mayfield that she attended a rural elementary school, which she says had "terrible teachers and poor students" and left her wanting to attend the more urban Mayfield schools. She did attend Mayfield High School, and in 1960 she wrote for the local newspaper, the Mayfield Messenger.
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