In the light of a disturbing abdication of responsibility among major critics with respect to the continuing importance of reading our modern writers, the recent critical neglect of Flannery O'Connor should not be surprising….
Since the appearance of her first novel, Wise Blood, over ten years ago, Miss O'Connor has not exactly overwhelmed either critics or readers with her gifts. There has not been merely neglect, however, but hostility as well…. Even her professed friends have often damned her with the faint praise of continuing the great modern tradition of "Southern Gothic." One barrier to her acceptance has surely been that, rather like the farmers in her region who are paid not to overproduce, her production has been severely limited in quantity. She has written only two novels and a baker's dozen of short stories. Her small "quota" is a function, I think, not only of her exquisite sense of perfection, but of the narrow range of theme and subject-matter she has allowed herself to explore. Yet within this self-imposed boundary, and setting aside the question of whether one need embrace her values, Flannery O'Connor is one of the best writers of fiction we have. If she were never to write another line, her position as a distinguished minor American writer would be as secure as that of Sarah Orne Jewett or Elinor Wylie. (p. 195)
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Read the rest of this Criticism with our O'Connor, (Mary) Flannery 1925–1964: Critical Essay by Maurice Bassan Access Pass.
