Mary Flannery O'Connor, Mystery and Manners

Alfred Castle (Independent Scholar - North America)

Ed. by Stephen E. Meats, Pittsburg State University
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.4: American (US) Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary, 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Christopher Hugh Gair (University of Glasgow), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Kerry Myler (Newman University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1964

Places

United States (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Non-Fiction
- Essay Collection

Resources

At her death in 1964, Flannery O’Connor left behind a valuable group of unpublished essays and lectures as well as several published critical articles. The insightful, often poignant writings were selected by her literary executor Robert Fitzgerald and his wife Sally and published in 1969. Like her 31 short stories and two novels, the compositions are characterized by a directness and an understated simplicity that nonetheless reveal her analytical wit, her deep understanding of Catholic faith, and her sense of the absurd embedded in daily life.

As friends of the author, Sally and Robert Fitzgerald took on the job of editing not as professional scholars, but as admiring amateurs. Moreover, they admit to rewriting certain …

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2733 words

Citation: Castle, Alfred. "Mystery and Manners". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 03 January 2013 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=10266, accessed 22 November 2024.]

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