The Critical Response to Flannery O'Connor

(Hardback)

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As the author of such classic American short stories as A Good Man Is Hard to Find, Everything That Rises Must Converge, and Revelation, Flannery O'Connor has always been recognized as a distinctive voice in American literature. A devoutly Catholic, Southern author with serious literary ambitions, she dealt with topics such as the operation of grace in ordinary life, and the nature of evil, sin, and redemption. Fifty years after the publication of her first novel, Wise Blood, her fiction is acclaimed for its high literary value and with the publication of her Collected Works, her work has become part of the canon of American literature. This volume includes articles on the racial, critical, and theological controversies surrounding O'Connor's work. And, rather than presenting a consensus of literary opinion, it shows how different critics arrive at radically different interpretations of a given O'Connor story or novel. An introductory essay examines the growth of O'Connor's literary reputation and outlines the major approaches taken by literary scholars to interpreting and elucidating her work. The 47 pieces collected in this volume represent the diverse reactions her work has created. The items are grouped into three sections, each representing a chronological period: the first section compiles the reactions of critics during her lifetime, the second section compiles criticism from the 25 years that elapsed between her death in 1964 until the 1989 publication of her Collected Works, and the third section brings together new critical approaches that foreshadow future trends in O'Connor criticism.

Reviews

"Douglas Robillard has judiciously selected reviews and scholarly articles to present, in chronological order, the spectrum of critical opinion on Flannery O'Connor's works, from the earliest reviews (some of which Robillard presents because they are so entertainingly wrong-headed) to several of the best recent innovations in O'Connor scholarship. Beginning students of O'Connor as well as professional scholars will benefit from this rich gathering."-Marshall Bruce Gentry, Professor of English Georgia College & State University, Editor, Flannery O'Connor Review
"Douglas Robillard, Jr. has pulled together an excellent collection of criticism on Flannery O'Connor's fiction. For the O'Connor scholar it provides a convenient collection of many of the significant reviews of O'Connor's books and even introduces some of us to a few essays that slipped under the MLA bibliography radar. For the O'Connor novice, in addition to making easily accessible a large chunk of O'Connor criticism, this book's very readable introductory essay critiques the growth of a literary reputation from the initial bafflement of much of the literary world in 1952 when Wise Blood was published to O'Connor's entry into American canon celebrated with the 1998 American Library edition of her collected works to contemporary new directions in O'Connor studies."-Virginia Wray, Professor of English Lyon College, President, the Flannery O'Connor Society

Author Bio

DOUGLAS ROBILLARD JR. is Professor of English at the University of Arkansas, Pine Bluff. He specializes in modern literature but as a generalist he has diverse teaching and research interests.