I will see this movie and report back. Movies about religious figures and writers rarely succeed, because their lives are focused inwardly and Flannery O’Connor was both. With O’Conner it would be easy to treat her as an eccentric instead of what she was: one of the sanest humans to ever walk the ground. We shall see.
Someone whose work I must read. A few quotes that I saw on-line:
The stories are hard but they are hard because there is nothing harder or less sentimental than Christian realism … When I see these stories described as horror stories I am always amused because the reviewer always has hold of the wrong horror.
Grace changes us and the change is painful.
You know, I’m an integrationist by principle & a segregationist by taste. I don’t like Negros.
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Flannery O’Connor doesn’t strike me as a very likeable woman, but if the above quotes are any indication, she was very perceptive and rigorously honest. It is regretable that she died so young from complications due to Lupus. Hopefully she is now enjoying the beatific vision with no further affliction.
I will remember the quote the next time a peacock in full display blocks the single lane road from my house, and reflect. Perhaps a smile and simple “Thanks!”, instead of my usual “Outta my way, ya damn dumb bird!” Love them, though.
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LQC, I would encourage reading her stories, to be sure! I might recommend–not that anybody asked me–“The Displaced Person” (considered one of her finest, and I can see why), “A Vessel of the Holy Ghost,” and “A Good Man Is Hard to Find.” There is also an excerpt from an uncompleted novel that is in the collected works with an amazing last line (as best I can remember): “Then she realized with a start that the man with the sword coming out of his mouth was Jesus.”
Many years ago I read “Everything the Rises must Converge” collection of short stories. I was most impressed with the variety of her settings. Leant the volume to a good friend who also shared my opinion.