It's not summer without revisiting a bit of Flannery O'Connor. Last night, we did a bit of listening to, 'Revelation,' from the collection bearing the title, Everything that Rises Must Converge. I was spurred on to this by sharing with Eric some thoughts from Jonathon Rogers book, The Terrible Speed of Mercy. A Spiritual Biography of Flannery O'Connor. JR (Jonathon Rogers) is a wonderful writer, thought provoking teacher of grammar of language and writing, as well as story teller and published author of fiction, and podcaster at The Habit part of the The Rabbit Room Network.
The passage to follow comes from Chapter 8, 'A Good Man is Hard to Find: 1954-1955.' from JR's book The Terrible Speed of Mercy. Her reaction to reviews on her stories is the subject and consequently a consideration of why and how she could write about such disturbing subject matters.
'The Kenyon Review, which had first published several of the stories included in 'A Good Man is Hard to Find,' ran a review that described the book as "profane, blasphemous, and outrageous," though the reviewer didn't seem to think that was necessarily a bad thing. "Miss O'Connor is consistent in her condemnation," the reviewer wrote."...
"The notice in the Kenyan Review wasn't, in fact, a negative review. But, in O'Connor's mind, it was one of many that utterly missed the point of what she was trying to do in her stories. 'I am mighty tired of reading reviews that call A Good Man brutal and sarcastic,' she wrote.
"'The stories are hard but they are hard because there is nothing harder or less sentimental than Christian realism. I believe that there are many rough beasts now slouching toward Bethlehem to be born and that I have reported the progress of a few of them, and when I see these stories described as horror stories I am always amused because the reviewer always has hold of the wrong horror.
I recommend the audio book. The narrators are excellent.
" For O'Connor, the real horror was never violence or deformity, but damnation. Horror that awakens a soul to its own danger and prepares it to receive grace is no horror, but a mercy. 'The devil,' she wrote, 'accomplishes a good deal of groundwork that seems to be necessary before grace is effective. '"
For me, Flannery O'Connor is a bit like a Great Aunt one visits periodically. You leave with a greater understanding of your roots, especially if you were raised in the south. It's not easy reading or easy listening. But as JR reminds us, Flannery didn't used non-PC language to offend but awaken the reader to a truer story being told. She would however, correct this niece of southern heritage that the story was not written for propaganda. She wrote the real stories so they would bear out the truth, and not a contrived version of who the characters were or should be. JR summarizes so well her thoughts on this, "The duty of the fiction writer -- the Christian writer no less than any other writer --is to look clearly and fearlessly at what is-- not what ought to be-- and to use those concrete facts as the raw material for fiction. Ironically, it is only when the fiction writer obeys the laws of his or her art, rather than resorting to propaganda, that the sense of the Transcendent has a chance to exert itself." O'Connor called it, 'grounding it in concrete, observable reality.'
Elisabeth Elliot had something to say on this matter. While some may not see the characters in O'Connor's books worthy of mercy, that they got what was coming to them, I believe we miss yet another point. To observe sin, pain, horror, discord with creation, one who perpetuates grief or tragedy, on themselves or another, has learned this somewhere. They are likely the recipient of that which would drive this to action. As Karen Swallow Prior remarks in her fine book, On Reading Well, ' we are all Mrs. Turpin,' at times in our lives. No one escapes with out sin. And no one escapes the consequences of sin. Elisabeth Elliot addresses one of the consequences of sin- pain- very eloquently. 'I am not a theologian or a scholar, but I am very aware of the fact that pain is necessary to all of us. In my own life, I think I can honestly say that out of the deepest pain has come the strongest conviction of the presence of God and the love of God. ' While we would not wish pain, sin, brokenness or horror upon anyone, it is up to us to see things the way they are, what we have done with God's creation, and appreciate the depth of God's mercy and grace.
