Date: Fri, 11 Aug 2000 21:48:32 -0400
From: Barron <gebarron-AT-InfoAve.Net>
Subject: Re: PLC: Flannery O'Connor


On 8/11/00 7:43 PM Michael Harrawood wrote:

> O'Connor is one of my faves, a Southern Catholic like me.  What is it that
> draws you to her work?

I'm not a scholar so my terms might be awkward but I think it is the
precision of her work that draws me. Each of her two novels and most of her
short stories are precisely crafted. She admitted to fussing over the
utility and composition of every sentence, and this is evident. There are
layers of recurrent themes and allusions. Her foreshadowing is subtle and
poigniant without being gratuitous or clue-like. It seems that every detail
is significant. No reference to a bird, a leaf, a star, a time of day, a
facial expression is without significance and she accomplishes this without
being cryptic or overly ingenious. She sets a standard of conciseness that
borders on perfection in this regard, IMHO. Her work has poetic precision
without being poetic. I am reminded of a symphony or even a Goya painting.

The second attraction for me is her almost universal theme of redemption.
Admittedly, these moments and acts of redemption are often cryptic but they
are this way to fortify the whole of the theme which is that redemption
comes when you least expect it and deserve it and it comes in mysterious
ways. Reading her work twice is almost a necessity. (This might be a vailid
criticism of O'Conner but I suspect more a criticism of me.) Her ability to
present this theme (which she deeply believed in) to the secular world
without being moralistic, apologetic, transparently allegorical or
evangelizing is truly remarkable to me and seems to be a singular
accomplishment. What other modern writers have done this within a  Christian
context?
 
Third is the Gothic Grotesque, a term she eschewed but that despite its true
meaning _sounds_ like an apt description of her work to me. There is such an
_otherliness_ to her characters, especially I imagine, for those who have
never lived in the South. They are odd and often repulsive but one can't
stop looking at them.

Fourth is Flannery herself. As John Cleese playing the taunting French
soldier referring to Graham Chapman playing King Arthur in The Holy Grail
might say, "What a strange person."  She seems to be an illusive and
reclusive figure and I'm sure she would have remained so if not for the
publication of her letters. They are a pleasure to read. Her candor is
remarkable. Her wit is piercing. And she openly discusses her work without
the vagueness and illusiveness of many authors who often appear simply
obtuse rather than  unapproachably wise as they'd like to be seen. She is
not shy about discussing her techniques and goals. She is not shy about
dismissing the criticism that misses the mark either. She seems to me to be
Faulkner's antithesis in this regard; no drunken or senile
misrepresentations of her work. (She wasn't a drinker and didn't live long
enough to get senile.)

Finally, for the student, the body of her work is small and apprehendable.
In a thousand pages you can read virtually everything she wrote. And yet,
there are limitless possibilities in those thousand pages. Well, this has
been weak, but maybe you get my drift.

 >I remember being surprised once, although I
> probably shouldn't have been, when Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe told a
> philosophy class at Berkeley that Wise Blood was one of the best and most
> philosophical novels to come out of the US.  (Those French guys!)

Faulkner, O'Conner, Lewis.
-- 
Barron





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