The next book we’ll be reading at the book club is probably by Flannery O’Connor. I read one of her books in grad school, for a course in Postmodern American literature. I passionately detested every one of the 14 books we read in that course. It never happened to me before or since that I’d hate so many books in a row. But I want to try this writer again because I have a feeling that much of the hatred for those books had to do with the way they were taught.
Another Try
Published
“probably by Flannery O’Connor”
I love Flannery O’Connor, maybe partly because I grew up in the general vicinity of people that were a lot like some of her characters (not in my family but…. kind of around).
I discovered her in a writing course where the instructor (a million miles from her philosophically) admired the structure of her short stories.
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I understand America a lot better, so I think I’ll be ready to enjoy it. 15 years ago it was all very bewildering.
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“it was all very bewildering”
She’s been known to bewilder born USians as well, so you’re in good company.
She’s partly in the Southern Gothic tradition (so deviance and violence are always lurking around the edges*) and her extreme Catholicism (very unSouthern) informs a lot of her writing.
*but in the US South almost even (especially?) the most realist writing is going to feel a bit gothic, it’s just that kind of place.
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I really loved her short story “Everything That Rises Must Converge”, gave a Russian translation to my mother and she liked it too. If you haven’t read it yet – highly recommended!
Her another story “Greenleaf” was so religiously written that it was completely incomprehensible till I read analysis on Internet.
“Everything That Rises Must Converge” also has a religious dimension, yet is perfectly understandable and enjoyable w/o knowing this context. Reading about religiously coded meaning did enrich the story, but I LOVED it regardless of this.
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Flannery O’Connor is one of the very greatest literary authors of the world: you’ll be in for a nice surprise.
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