Flannery O'Connor : Collected Works : Wise Blood / A Good Man Is Hard to Find / The Violent Bear It Away / Everything that Rises Must Converge / Essays & Letters (Library of America)
by Flannery O'Connor
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I have so little time for thoughtful review; instead, I opt for a series of favorite passages from each book; (my apologies to authors everywhere for confounding intent by taking these out of context!) -
"There is another reason in the Southern situation that makes for a tendency toward the grotesque and this is the prevalence of good Southern writers. I think the writer is initially set going by literature more than by life. When there are many writers all employing the sale idiom, all looking out on more or less the same social scene, the individual writer will have to be more than ever careful that he isn't just doing badly what has already been done to completion. The presence alone of Faulkner in our midst makes a great difference in what the writer can and cannot permit himself to do. Nobody wants his mule and wagon stalled on the same track the Dixie Limited is roaring down." - from "The Grotesque in Southern Fiction"...more
"There is another reason in the Southern situation that makes for a tendency toward the grotesque and this is the prevalence of good Southern writers. I think the writer is initially set going by literature more than by life. When there are many writers all employing the sale idiom, all looking out on more or less the same social scene, the individual writer will have to be more than ever careful that he isn't just doing badly what has already been done to completion. The presence alone of Faulkner in our midst makes a great difference in what the writer can and cannot permit himself to do. Nobody wants his mule and wagon stalled on the same track the Dixie Limited is roaring down." - from "The Grotesque in Southern Fiction"...more
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The writing style of Flannery O'Connor awakens the reader with its felicity. Miss O'Connor imagination takes over from there and the ride is a wild one. Wise Blood, the first work in this collection, is a nightmarish take on the world of southern itenerant preachers. Hazel Motes' Church without Christ is a bleakly humorous approach to the whole god/man situation and Motes own psychology is worth studying through rereadings of this short work. The collections of short fiction underscore the a...more
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Read in January, 1993
recommends it for:
anyone who's lived in the south.
This is the ultimate collection of works (I love the letters, too) from the most captivating female writer in American history. If you don't appreciate her work, you're not reading deep enough. Flannery's writing is so thick with subtext, so much symbolism, yet so oddly relatable, it's amazing that a white woman of the south could create such characters, such realism and do so with such mastery...and at such a young age. Her untimely death at age 39 cut short the potential for more greatness ...more
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By far my favorite short story writer. Coming from a staunch Christian background, O'Connor creates these brilliant characters, juxtaposing the blind-faithed with the blind hearted. Forget identifying the protagonist and the antagonist, there's good and grotesque in everyone. But I must wonder...
O'Connor was actually a staunch Catholic. However it seems that many of the "religious figures" are written as Evangelical characters (going to tent revivals and whatnot). As these ch...more
O'Connor was actually a staunch Catholic. However it seems that many of the "religious figures" are written as Evangelical characters (going to tent revivals and whatnot). As these ch...more
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Read in March, 1989
We read Everything that Rises Must Converge at about the same time that we read the Dred Scott decision. My poor seminar had to put up with my unresolved issues around race (as anyone who talks to me today must -- but I hope that I am a little less arrogant and a little more aware these days), because nothing shuts me up. Plus, I loved the story, so there was no way I was not going to talk.
I have read the remaining stories since. I can't recommend them highly enough. Her characters are so r...more
I have read the remaining stories since. I can't recommend them highly enough. Her characters are so r...more
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I'm about halfway through with this. It's on my bedside table and I occasionally pick it up and read another story.
The stories are arranged in the order they were written. There's no reason to even bother reviewing an author of this caliber. I bought the collected works from the O'Connor Foundation, an organization I'd recently volunteered with, and I wanted to reread the stories I'd read before and cover the others I hadn't yet.
Why haven't I finished? Once you see how many books I'm cur...more
The stories are arranged in the order they were written. There's no reason to even bother reviewing an author of this caliber. I bought the collected works from the O'Connor Foundation, an organization I'd recently volunteered with, and I wanted to reread the stories I'd read before and cover the others I hadn't yet.
Why haven't I finished? Once you see how many books I'm cur...more
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Read in January, 2000
This is the definitive Flannery collection...I picked up a copy during a visit to Andalusia (the O'Connor family farm at which Flannery spent her final years) a few years back. It has her novels, her short stories, and her letters, which are every bit as entertaining as her work. They do remove a bit of the romance though...she was a staunch southern Catholic, and her straightforward righteousness seems like a shame...the same way that reading Kant on god is a shame...such a keen mind, but we al...more
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Working my way through chronologically, so I'm on Wise Blood. Flannery's writing is wonderful, as we all know. But one thing strikes me--her characters don't seem like they want you to know them. As opposed to Eudora Welty, who throws her readers immediately into the action, and you feel like your playing catch up trying to follow the plot and discover the backstory. Not that what Flannery is doing is less interesting, just different. I'm curious how the rest of the novel will end as well a...more
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I've read "Everything That Rises Must Converge" and "The Comforts of Home". O'Connor describes a fully embodied Gospel in these grotesque short stories, one which is shot through with grace and sacrifice. The grace of God is an irresistible product of events and motives, both righteous and wicked. God works through us, whether we want Him to or not, and it is not always pretty in her stories, as she does not shy away from ugliness and a gothic sensibility.
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Read in January, 2006
That Flannery O'Connor died before turning forty is maybe the biggest tragedy in the history of American literature. Make sure to read the letters, where she comes off every bit as funny, humane, and original as you'd expect the author of Wise Blood to be. After reading them, I finally had an answer to that inane question people ask you sometimes: "If you could invite anyone, living or dead, over for dinner..."
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Read in October, 1996
recommends it for:
misanthropes and drunken preachers.
Her prose style and observational skills are spare and neat to the quick. Southern gothic, worn around the edges: failed redemption, damnation, stupidity, and general human ugliness abound. Not to be read if you're needing reassurance as to man's inherent goodness, but very satisfying at the right moments, when you feel like cleansing your belly with a bit of fire.
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Read in December, 2006
I can't believe it took me 29 years to finally read Flannery O'Connor. Maybe reading her during the festive winter holidays wasn't the greatest choice...or maybe it was? The stark contrast of Christmas trees and Joy to the World against her surprisingly dark loss-of-innocence stories certainly left an imprint. I can't wait to read more.
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The thumb caught in the car door - not yours - with great wry wit and excellent command of the music of language. I often prefer to explore writers through their short stories before tackling their novels. O'Conner is one of the best short works writers going. I hope her works continue to age well.Recomomended.
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Read in January, 1993
I first read Flannery O'Connor when I was in high school. I think she is amazing! There's something about her stories that just puts me right in her world and I have a hard time coming back to mine. When I was in college I did a film project that adapted "Good Country People," One of my favorites!
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I'd probably give Flannery O'Connor five stars if the stories weren't so disturbing (which I guess is the mark of a good short story). So she probably deserves five stars, and people who've never read her work should try at least one story to get a taste of her genius.
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I've managed to break out of only reading the southern gothics, but seriously, this woman is my favorite short story writer ever. Read: "A Good Man...", "The River", "Everything That Rises Must Converge", "The Lame Shall Enter First" for sure
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I've read all her tragically small collection of books and stories and loved the hell out of them. Forget Catcher in the Rye – Wise Blood was the story that lit my adolescent fire. I must have read that novel 3 or 4 times in high school.
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No one alive can write like O'Connor. Her short stories are absolute masterpieces--not a word could be deleted, and her voice is perfection. But I dislike her novels. Too much blood and guts atonement--she sounds almost tired in them.
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Wise Blood surprised me with its language and sharp storytelling. I was reading O'Connor, Denis Johnson, and Raymond Carver all at the same time, and they seemed like contemporaries! O'Connor is a must-read.
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The prize of my collection. O'Connor's short stories are masterful depictions of human nature at its grittiest. She looks at humanity for what it is but offers a ray of hope that not all is lost.
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book data (includes all editions)
avg rating (all editions): 4.60 (517 ratings) number of reviews: 43popular shelves
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quote
"
"You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you odd."
~ Flannery O'Connor"
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