false 48467 10 <I>Wise Blood</I> is a comedy with a fierce, Old Testament soul. Flannery O'Connor has no truck with such newfangled notions as psychology. Driven by forces outside their control, her characters are as one-dimensional--and mysterious--as figures on a frieze. Hazel Motes, for instance, has the temperament of a martyr, even though he spends most of the book trying to get God to go away. As a child he's convinced that "the way to avoid Jesus was to avoid sin." When that doesn't work, and when he returns from Korea determined "to be converted to nothing instead of evil," he still can't go anywhere without being mistaken for a preacher. (Not that the hat and shiny glare-blue suit help.) No matter what Hazel does, Jesus moves "from tree to tree in the back of his mind, a wild ragged figure motioning him to turn around and come off into the dark..."<p> Adrift after four years in the service, Hazel takes a train to the city of Taulkinham, buys himself a "rat-colored car," and sets about preaching on street corners for the Church Without Christ, "where the blind don't see and the lame don't walk and what's dead stays that way." Along the way he meets Enoch Emery, who's only 18 years old but already works for the city, as well the blind preacher Asa Hawks and his illegitimate daughter, Sabbath Lily. (Her letter to an advice column: "Dear Mary, I am a bastard and a bastard shall not enter the kingdom of heaven as we all know, but I have this personality that makes boys follow me. Do you think I should neck or not?") Subsequent events involve a desiccated, centuries-old dwarf--Gonga the Giant Jungle Monarch--and Hazel's nemesis, Hoover Shoats, who starts the rival Church of Christ Without Christ. If you think these events don't end happily, you might be right.<p> <I>Wise Blood</I> is a savage satire of America's secular, commercial culture, as well as the humanism it holds so dear ("Dear Sabbath," Mary Brittle writes back, "Light necking is acceptable, but I think your real problem is one of adjustment to the modern world. Perhaps you ought to re-examine your religious values to see if they meet your needs in Life.") But the book's ultimate purpose is Religious, with a capital R--no metaphors, no allusions, just the thing itself in all its fierce glory. When Hazel whispers "I'm not clean," for instance, O'Connor thinks he is perfectly right. For readers unaccustomed to holding low comedy and high seriousness in their heads at the same time, all this can come as something of a shock. Who else could offer an allegory about free will, redemption, and original sin right alongside the more elemental pleasure of witnessing Enoch Emery dress up in a gorilla suit? Nobody else, that's who. And that's OK. More than one Flannery O'Connor in this world might show us more truth than we could bear. <I>--Mary Park</I> 1046530 1949 Wise Blood: A Novel total:3064|5:1040|4:1145|3:625|2:181|1:73| 3064 12090 4194 318 2 21 false false Sun Mar 01 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Sun Mar 29 06:38:35 -0700 2009 Sun Mar 29 07:15:14 -0700 2009
And what have I learned from this statistical factoid?

Surely, (1) that it is the best of all policies to avoid the reviews of others be...more...]]> 3 7 false false Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Tue Jan 08 13:50:26 -0800 2008 Thu Jan 10 13:52:13 -0800 2008 more...]]> 1 4 false false Mon Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Wed Oct 24 11:29:37 -0700 2007 Thu Oct 25 18:40:29 -0700 2007 more...]]> 2 2 false false Fri Jun 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Jun 07 14:04:17 -0700 2007 Fri Jul 06 23:26:28 -0700 2007
Ok, so th...more...]]> 3 1 false false Mon Aug 17 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon Aug 03 16:01:19 -0700 2009 Tue Aug 18 14:54:44 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 1 false false Sat Sep 20 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Sun Sep 14 19:32:05 -0700 2008 Sat Sep 20 18:58:07 -0700 2008 more...]]> 4 1 false false Tue Feb 19 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Fri Feb 22 11:46:58 -0800 2008 Fri Feb 22 11:53:02 -0800 2008 more...]]> 5 1 false false Tue Oct 02 09:57:17 -0700 2007 Tue Oct 02 10:33:29 -0700 2007
...more...]]> 5 1 false false Mon Sep 01 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Thu Aug 28 10:14:21 -0700 2008 Mon Oct 13 12:06:54 -0700 2008
Propelled b...more...]]> 5 2 false false Mon Jun 23 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Sat Jun 21 10:01:10 -0700 2008 Mon Jun 23 07:17:25 -0700 2008
Wise Blood is like an upside-down insi...more...]]> 3 1 false false Mon Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Mon Oct 08 19:00:36 -0700 2007 Mon Nov 26 22:59:44 -0800 2007 more...]]> 5 1 false false Fri Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 1993 Sat Apr 18 14:49:18 -0700 2009 Sat Apr 18 14:49:18 -0700 2009 5 0 false false Tue Dec 02 10:37:13 -0800 2008 Tue Dec 02 10:49:18 -0800 2008 Her stories are so painfu...more...]]> 3 0 false false Thu Jul 09 11:04:24 -0700 2009 Thu Jul 09 12:51:07 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false true Sun Mar 01 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Sat Apr 18 20:55:23 -0700 2009 Sat Apr 18 21:06:04 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 1 false false Sat Nov 15 18:46:39 -0800 2008 Sun Nov 23 05:55:38 -0800 2008 4 1 false false Tue Apr 14 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Jul 30 21:12:22 -0700 2008 Wed Apr 15 17:19:05 -0700 2009
O'Connor's unflattering portrayal of characters and cut-throat denouements are what attract me to her wo...more...]]> 3 0 false true Sat Sep 19 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Sep 16 16:49:38 -0700 2009 Mon Sep 21 05:35:41 -0700 2009 Mr. Hazel Motes used to dream of being a preacher but after the World War he came to a conclusion that to escape to sin to have no soul. He went to the town of Taulkinham. That was where he bought his car (a second-hand, rat-colored Essex) and lost his virginity but not at the same ti...more...]]> 4 0 false false Thu May 14 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Sun May 03 05:24:39 -0700 2009 Fri May 15 16:29:12 -0700 2009 more...]]> 1 0 false false Tue Sep 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Sat Sep 05 12:26:24 -0700 2009 Thu Sep 24 13:46:34 -0700 2009 more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=337107