Katherine Anne Porter was born in Indian Creek, Texas, in 1890. Her mother died when she was two, and her family moved to Austin where she and her four siblings were raised by their paternal grandmother. When she was eleven, Porter's grandmother died and she was sent to convent schools, first in Texas, and then in Louisiana. At sixteen she ran away from the school's stifling environment and got married—her first of four trips to the altar. The union ended in divorce three years later, and Porter, who called herself a "roving spirit," found work in various cities as it pleased her.

First she moved to Chicago, where she was a journalist and movie extra; then Denver, Colorado, where she worked as a drama critic for the Rocky Mountain News; and then New York City. At this time, when she was only twenty-eight, she suffered a...