SOURCE: A review of "A Worn Path" in The Explicator, Vol. XXIV, No. 6, February, 1966, item 56.

In the following review, Trefman argues that the protagonist's name, Phoenix, has Christian, as well as mythological, significance.

In his discussion of Eudora Welty's "A Worn Path," (Explicator, June, 1957), William Jones identifies the central character, Old Phoenix, with the legendary bird of Egyptian folklore. Her arduous journey from her home, far out in the country, to the town of Natchez to help her ailing little grandson, is a journey of love, Jones suggests, that causes her own rejuvenation at its end. But perhaps her association with the Phoenix has even greater significance. This is, after all, a Christmas story, and when Phoenix and her grandson are viewed as different aspects of the same entity, this single being is clearly a symbol of Christ. Phoenix herself implies that she and her grandson are creatures...