Undated: Flannery O'Connor

1960 sees the publication in February of "The Violent Bear It Away," the second (and last) novel by the influential Georgia-born author, as well as the essay "Some Aspects of the Grotesque in Southern Fiction." The latter was not published during her lifetime (O'Connor died in 1964); it was a lecture given at Wesleyan College in Macon, Ga., in October. It contains this passage: "Of course, I have found that anything that comes out of the South is going to be called grotesque by the Northern reader, unless it is grotesque, in which case it is going to be called realistic."

* Short biographies: @ and @ and @

* www.flanneryconnor.org (lots of information and links): @

* Essays by Joyce Carol Oates: @

* Text of "Some Aspects of the Grotesque in Southern Fiction": @
* Audio of O'Connor reading the essay: @

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