Timothy Gatreaux – A Catholic Who Happens to Write

Tim Gautreaux 2008
Image by Randy Bergeron

I prefer to think of myself as “A writer who happens to live in the South,” so by extention I prefer to be “A Catholic who happens to write.”  -Timothy Gautreaux

Timothy Gautreaux was born in 1947, in Morgan City, Louisiana, a son of a tugboat captain and the grandson of a steamboat chief engineer¹.  In an interview with Christopher Scanlan, he recounts how, as a youth, he had enjoyed using a typewriter someone had given him and penning tall tales about hunting alligators to his pen pals.  Gautreaux did not begin to take writing seriously until he took a writing course under Walker Percy.  He later became a creative writing teacher at Southeastern Louisiana University where he was eventually named writer in residence².  Today Gautreaux is retired, married and the father of grown children, he lives north of Lake Pontchartrain in Hammond, Loisianna³.

Relationship to Catholicism

I've always been a Roman Catholic, since baptism, since birth¹.  

-Timothy Gautreaux

Timothy Gautreaux grew up in a very Catholic town in a Louisiana.  He describes it as “a place where a local waitress…might habitually remind customers who had ordered a dish containing meet that it was Friday.²” He speaks highly of the nuns that taught him during the twelve years he attended Catholic Parochial school.  During his childhood, Gautreaux’s mother made sure that he observed all the precepts Church and many of the devotions.  Today, Gautreaux prefers to describes himself as “Catholic who happens to write” as opposed to a Catholic writer².

Writing

Every little neighborhood contains all the universal themes any writer needs.  

-Timothy Gautreaux

            Gautreax’s writing often takes place in Louisiana where he spent most of his life.  He often depicts life in small towns and rural area.  He tends to focus on less educated towns and rural areas because the people there are “infinitely more creative” in the way they express themselves².  Gautreaux’s writing is often humorous, but he is also competent in writing darker and more serious works as is evident from his novel The Clearing.  

Works Cited

1.  Bauer, Margaret D. "An Interview with Tim Gautreaux: "Cartographer of Louisiana Back Roads"" Southernspaces.org. Southern Spaces, 28 May 2009. Web. 01 Feb. 2012. <http://www.southernspaces.org/2009/interview-tim-gautreaux-cartographer-louisiana-back-roads>.

2. Nisly, L. Lamar. "A Catholic Who Happens to Write: An Interview with Tim Gautreaux." Interdisciplinary Literary Studies 8.2 (2007): 92-99.

3.  Scanlan, Christopher. "Tim Gautreaux." Http://clatl.com. Creative Loafing Atlanta, 17 June 2004. Web. 01 Feb. 2012. <http://clatl.com/atlanta/tim-gautreaux/Content?oid=1248256>.