Sign in with Facebook
matt's Reviews > A Good Man Is Hard to Find and Other Stories
A Good Man Is Hard to Find and Other Stories
by Flannery O'Connor
by Flannery O'Connor
matt's review
bookshelves: fictions-of-the-big-it, miniature, top-shelf, america-f-k-yeah, shattering, favorites, ladies-night
Feb 12, 08
bookshelves: fictions-of-the-big-it, miniature, top-shelf, america-f-k-yeah, shattering, favorites, ladies-night
Read in February, 2002
This stuff is twisted, sparse, clipped, dark, doomy, funny, dramatic, Southern, angry, sexy, super Catholic, death-haunted, maniacial, bizarre, possibly racist, apparently desperate, fatalistic, existential, dreary, ugly, fetid, frenzied, morbid, lax, stern, prepossessing, unforgiving, unrelenting, anti-everything, aged, "retro", haunting, parabolic, anecdotal, moral, redemptive, sublime, reasoned, feverish, dreamlike, unsparing, sparse, I said that one already, seductive, craftsmanlike, worried, extremely well concieved, taut, brooding, polarizing, scary, and powerful.
I literally didn't know one could write like this until I heard her do it.
I didn't know that the human mind would concieve of this until she did. Not that it's simply freaky- o no, that would be too easy- it's just so carefully done and well-proportioned in its flatness and its odd grace.
Masterpieces, pretty much to a story.
!
?
I literally didn't know one could write like this until I heard her do it.
I didn't know that the human mind would concieve of this until she did. Not that it's simply freaky- o no, that would be too easy- it's just so carefully done and well-proportioned in its flatness and its odd grace.
Masterpieces, pretty much to a story.
!
?
Sign into Goodreads to see if any of your friends have read A Good Man Is Hard to Find and Other Stories.
sign in »
Quotes matt Liked
“All my stories are about the action of grace on a character who is not very willing to support it, but most people think of these stories as hard, hopeless and brutal.”
― Flannery O'Connor, A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories
― Flannery O'Connor, A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories
Comments (showing 1-15 of 15) (15 new)
date
newest »
newest »
message 1:
by
Kathy
(new)
Jul 13, 2008 08:14am
Exactly! She not only percieves, recognizes, and acknowledges the dark-side of man, religion (the universe and everything)she eloquently, artistically paints a masterpiece in words displaying her un-canny ability to understand the motives behind some of the most bizzare behaviors and actions of man-kind. Not a squeamish lady that Flannery.
reply
|
flag
*
I hate being asked, "Who's your favorite author?" because there are simply too many possibilities, and it makes my brain hurt. O'Connor might be my favorite author of short stories, though.
Matt, I recently read The Complete Stories and was blown away. I also recommend her volume of literary criticism, Mystery and Manners: Occasional Prose.
Yeah, the stories are just...magnificent. Kafka was right- we need to read the books that are like axes for the frozen sea inside us, and Flannery is definitely one of those for me. The power in things like "Parker's Back", "The Displaced Person", "The Artificial Nigger" (I still feel queasy just typing it), "Good Country People", the one where the dilapidated confederate general slowly passes off to death in front of a Coke machine at his grandkid's high school graduation...
I'm definitely aware of and certainly want to read her incidental prose, I just tend to hold off on those kinds of works when the writer I love (DFW applies here, too) is dead and there's relatively little work to be able to read afresh, you know?
Agreed, but arguably her Everything that Rises, even better--or (slightly) more complex. See my review bec it's about teaching it ALL instead of various writers, and the effect on a freshman class.
I might have, I'm pretty sure I know what you're talking about, but I think it was a long time ago...
Hortense wrote: "Have you read her wonderful essay on Peacocks?"Yes, she raised 'em in her town, the former capital of GA.
