Content Category
Literary Criticism
Abstract/Description
The works of Flannery O’Connor deal greatly with the concepts of grace and religion and how they save the lost characters in her stories. O’Connor’s works are very violent, as well as religious. Story after story shows that God “terrifies before He can bless,” as Robert Drake asserts in his article “The Bleeding Stinking Mad Shadow of Jesus” (185). There are many instances where it is doubtful that grace has been received, and when it has been, the characters are distinctly worse off than they were before. This is prevalent in all of O’Connor’s short stories, and when looking through a Marxist lens, the violent means by which grace is conveyed ultimately deconstructs her intention that it is a means of salvation, supporting the Marxist ideology that religion is harmful. Her revolutionary standpoint also demonstrates how her version of grace deconstructs even within Catholicism, and stifles the proletariat.
Copyright and Licensing of My Content
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Origin of Submission
as part of a class
Faculty Involvement
Jeffrey Tucker
Location
4116 JFSB
Start Date
17-3-2016 8:30 AM
End Date
17-3-2016 9:30 AM
Included in
Deconstructing O'Connor's Grace Through Marxism
4116 JFSB
The works of Flannery O’Connor deal greatly with the concepts of grace and religion and how they save the lost characters in her stories. O’Connor’s works are very violent, as well as religious. Story after story shows that God “terrifies before He can bless,” as Robert Drake asserts in his article “The Bleeding Stinking Mad Shadow of Jesus” (185). There are many instances where it is doubtful that grace has been received, and when it has been, the characters are distinctly worse off than they were before. This is prevalent in all of O’Connor’s short stories, and when looking through a Marxist lens, the violent means by which grace is conveyed ultimately deconstructs her intention that it is a means of salvation, supporting the Marxist ideology that religion is harmful. Her revolutionary standpoint also demonstrates how her version of grace deconstructs even within Catholicism, and stifles the proletariat.