Post Number 7:

Since my last post, I have finished "Wise blood".
I finished the tale of Hazel Motes' decent from a passionate preacher for the "church without Christ" to a humble and Blind Catholic, seeking redemption in himself. He dies at the end of the book.
What I noticed reading Ms. O'Connor's work is that I basically can't agree with it. I understand that she was taking the point of view of an extreme Catholic, but in every single one of her short stories, the ending is amusingly, but unfufillingly dark. Wise blood was no exception. Even though the book was a roller coaster of misguided people, and their bizarre ideals, the story was unnecessarily sad for the last chapter. Not because Hazel Motes dies, but because he dies a broken character. If he had repented, discovered a single joy in his life and then died in an ironic twist of fate, then I probably would have liked the ending more. But instead, he and the rest of the last chapter, withered away like the ending to "Spiderman 3". Both "Spiderman 3" and "Wise blood" had unnecessarily long and overdone endings meant to make the audience leave feeling somewhat of a bitter aftertaste remaining in their mouths. This kind of gimmick always felt like an unnecessary add-on to media after what was a humorous tale of human error. It was actually kind of tedious reading the last chapter of this book simply for that reason. I understand the perspective though. Repenting and accepting one's fate was a major theme in this book, so it's only appropriate that the last chapter has the previously pompous main character having an overhaul in the attitude department.
I guess my main gripe is, all of Flannery O'connor's stories are humors tales of the ignorant and bizarre, but they all end in one of the central characters Hanging themselves. Or Drowning. Or getting their farm set on fire. Or getting themselves and their entire family shot. Or dying of old age. Or being humiliated in a barber shop after trying to preach their ideals. Or getting punched an subsequently dying. Or, my personal favorite, stealing a gorilla suit and living the rest of their life on the run after scarring the tar out of a star-gazing couple.
All of these endings I've never understood. I know I'm not the only one, as most people I ask who have read her work don't understand either. I understand that bad ends are sometimes necessary for artistic purposes, but in a book of 30 something short stories, this can become a little depressing after the fourth or fifth time.
That is NOT to say she isn't a good writer. All these stories I have thoroughly enjoyed (until their ending that is,) due to the fact that they are amusing. All her stories have some strange occurrence in them, such as Enoch Emery Stealing a mummy at the end of the 5th chapter of 'Wise Blood" Or Red Sam and his monkey at the start of "The Misfit".
Flanner O'Connors' work has no doubt been amusing and thought provoking, and I don't think that I'll have any problems writing a review for her stories.

Post Number Six.

A general thesis blog post, in which you cover the following:

1. what you read since your last post, specified with titles and page numbers
2. a short plot summary of what you read in those pages
3. an analysis of theme or style in which you develop ideas for your paper

At this point in your blog, you need to be explicitly discussing paper ideas and/or challenges. Remember, the writing process must begin before the reading process ends.

Last wednesday (as in last week, not two days ago) I went to the library and picked up a copy of "Wise blood" and promptly read to chapter 7 by the time Monday rolled along. (Roughly the first 155 pages.)
So far, the novel focuses on Hazel Motes, a man everyone is convinced is a preacher. This annoys him to the point where he decides to form the church of "The Church Without Christ".
He believes the only way to find redemption is through Blasphemy, and after being belittle by a hooker he had been sleeping with, decides the best way to gain followers is to preach in the streets. He meets young man named Enoch Emery, a zoo guard and a relatively annoying guy who follows his "wise blood " rather then rational though. Hazel and Enoch also meet a Blind Preacher and his daughter. Hazel is annoyed by their devout faith in Christ, and challenges the preacher to a battle of faiths to see who can turn their opponent's faith first.
Hazel Makes it his point to get his "Church without Christ" off the ground, and to try and seduce the Preacher's Daughter.
What he doesn't realize is that The preacher's blindness isn't real, and that Hazel is about to embark on a comedic and psychologically bizarre journey into the basis of faith.

At least, that's what I WOULD write I knew how it ended. But there are so many directions the story can take at this point, that I don't know if this "journey into faith" is plausible or not. I'll update this again over the break.

Post Number 5

Now that you are climbing into your second book (or the equivalent), what thematic or stylistic threads do you notice across the texts? In other words, you are ready to start forming potential thesis statements for your American Author paper.

Primarily what I have noticed about Flannery O'connor is that she was a devout catholic.
Many people have told me this on my quest to understand her writing, but this seemingly random piece of information is vital in understanding all of her stories. Her stories usually involve some irredeemably moronic individual who meets their death by the end of each story. Their deaths are usually ironic or metaphorical for other religions, and are supposed to serve as basic morals.
In short, yes. I'm getting vague images of what my final paper is going to be like. I haven't fleshed them out or formulated a thesis yet, but I'll have something by the time I finish reading Wise Blood.

Blog Post 4:

Edit: It sent itself just now....
One title that stood out to me during my reading was "The Lame Shall enter first".
One common theme that I'm noticing is that most , if not all the stories that I've read so far have bad endings. I understand that Ms.O'Connor was a devout Catholic and there there is a lot of symbolism in her writing, but I fail to see the connecting most of the time. Her ending's aren't exactly that clear either.
I recall looking up the story I just mentioned and telling myself "OH! He HUNG himself at the end! That makes perfect sense now!"
I guess I'll keep trying to figure it out as I go along.

Blog Post 3

Over Break, I recall reading these short stories by Flannery O'connor:
-The Gereanium
-Everything that rises must converge.
-A good man is hard to find.
-A Late encounter with the enemy.
-The River
-The Circle in the fire.
and
-The Displaced Person.

Post two: passage.

"Throw me that Shirt, Bobby Lee," The Misfit said. The Shirt came flying at him and landed on his shoulder and he put it on. The grandmother couldn't name what the shirt reminded her of. "No lady," the Misfit said while he was buttoning it up, "I found out the crime don't matter. You can do one thing or you can do another, kill a man or take a tire off his car, because sooner or latter, you're going to forget what it was you done and just be punished for it."
Flannery O'Connor the complete stories, a good man is hard to find, page 130-131.

Post 1.

For my American author proposal, as well as the rest of this unit, I’ll be reading, analyzing and writing papers on Flannery O’connor.
Flannery O’connor was an American author born March 25^th 1925, and was initially famous not for her many books of short stories, but for teaching her chicken how to walk backwards, an action that would get O’connor filmed, and make her briefly famous.
When O’connor grew to adulthood, she graduated from the Peabody Laboratory School, and graduated in 1942. She also became Robert Fitzgerald’s roommate.
Flannery O’connor wrote 31 short stories, separated into 3 books, along with two novels, commentaries on various issues, and an archive of letters she would send to her friend, Bettey Hester.
A subject Flannery O’connor explores in her writing are religious themes, usually invlolving protestan characters, despite the fact that she was raised as a roman catholic herself.
The reason why I want to do my American Author paper on Flannery O’connor is because my parents told me about her, and after doing a bit of reserch, I discovered that all her short stories are, for the most part, serious, but blended with humor in order to make a very unique type of storytelling.
I also think that this is a good Author for me to focus on during the upcoming project because she has written several stories that can be analyzed and comapared but they are short enough that I won’t be tearing my hair out trying to get all of the read.
Short stories have always interested me because of they way that they’r able to sometimes convey the same character development, story arcs, and messages that novels are able to convey, but they’re in a compressed space, so if I get bored with them, then I won’t be stuck reading that particular section for long.
As for the books and short stories I’m going to read, I think I’m going to start by reading “Wise Blood” due to it being her first novel. Since the idea of the project is to cover as many different styles and stories any given author produces, I thought it would be a good Idea to start with the book the first long story that she wrote.
In any case, I look forward to reading these books. I haven’t read any short story collections before, and very few books with southern origins. These books should be able to help me expand my horizons a little bit.