‘The Life She Wished to Live’ Review: The Bard of Cross Creek

Rawlings worked hard to improve her writing, with the guidance and advice of three men. At the University of Wisconsin, she studied with William Ellery Leonard, who ordered her to write a story without adjectives and adverbs. When she said it couldn’t be done, he shouted: “And I say it can! I guess I ought to know more about adjectives and adverbs than a chit of a schoolgirl!”