Apr. 13, 2013 at 7:31pm with 46 notes
Reblogged from therumpus
writingflannery o'connorsymbolslit
“
Basically, my teaching involves just quoting Flannery O’Connor to students, and George Saunders. Just badly paraphrasing them. She has a wonderful essay where she talks about how if you want to say the wooden leg is a wooden leg in “Good Country People.”…She’s talking about her own drafting process, and I think somebody is asking her about how she inserts symbols into her stories, and she says, “If you want to call the wooden leg a symbol, it is that, but it was a wooden leg first.” It had a literal, concrete importance to the story. It arose naturally from the landscape of the story, and there’s nothing “inserted.” It feels absolutely essential to the story’s plot, and then it accretes meaning as the story rolls forward.
— The Rumpus Interview with Karen Russell (via therumpus)
Jul. 8, 2012 at 6:50pm
flannery o'connor
I suspect that most of them were done inside an hour’s time. If not, then she was dawdlin.’ This is very much in keeping with the medium. When worked warm, as on a hotplate, linoleum cuts like butter. The cutting tools meet little, if any, resistance. It cuts quick and easy. Later in her life she would say that the things that she worked on the hardest were usually her worst work. She also said that a story—or a linoleum print, if you will—has to have muscle as well as meaning, and the meaning has to be in the muscle. Her prints certainly have muscle, and a lot of it. Apparently Flannery O’Connor did linoleum cuts of cartoons in college?  (“Flannery O’Connor, Cartoonist,” The New York Review of Books)

I suspect that most of them were done inside an hour’s time. If not, then she was dawdlin.’ This is very much in keeping with the medium. When worked warm, as on a hotplate, linoleum cuts like butter. The cutting tools meet little, if any, resistance. It cuts quick and easy. Later in her life she would say that the things that she worked on the hardest were usually her worst work. She also said that a story—or a linoleum print, if you will—has to have muscle as well as meaning, and the meaning has to be in the muscle. Her prints certainly have muscle, and a lot of it.

Apparently Flannery O’Connor did linoleum cuts of cartoons in college? 

(“Flannery O’Connor, Cartoonist,” The New York Review of Books)

Dec. 12, 2011 at 8:05am with 31 notes
Reblogged from millionsmillions
flannery o'connorjoyce carol oates
millionsmillions: So, these dolls of Joyce Carol Oates and Flannery O’Conner exist. I feel that these dolls are very flattering. 

millionsmillions:

So, these dolls of Joyce Carol Oates and Flannery O’Conner exist.

I feel that these dolls are very flattering. 

Aug. 3, 2011 at 9:01pm with 170 notes
Reblogged from scribnerbooks
Flannery O'Connor
scribnerbooks: i12bent: Flannery O’Connor, Southern writer (of the novel Wise Blood and short stories) - died this day in 1964, aged 39, from lupus… “Whenever I’m asked why Southern writers particularly have a penchant for writing about freaks, I say it is because we are still able to recognize one.” — F. O’C. Photo of Flannery in front of her self-portrait w. peacock… Love her. Read her. Flanneryyyyyy.

scribnerbooks:

i12bent:

Flannery O’Connor, Southern writer (of the novel Wise Blood and short stories) - died this day in 1964, aged 39, from lupus…

“Whenever I’m asked why Southern writers particularly have a penchant for writing about freaks, I say it is because we are still able to recognize one.” — F. O’C.

Photo of Flannery in front of her self-portrait w. peacock…

Love her. Read her.

Flanneryyyyyy.

Apr. 24, 2011 at 10:09am
Flannery O'ConnorA Good Man Is Hard to Find
“
A good man is hard to find,” Red Sammy said. “Everything is getting terrible.
—

Flannery O’Connor (“A Good Man Is Hard to Find”)

… Nearly impossible, actually, I would say.