The Violent Bear It Away

The Violent Bear It Away is by Flannery O'Connor. It is her second novel. She published 3 short story books and 2 novels. Today it amounts to 3 books with the stories collected into one volume.

I'm also reading Flannery: A Life of Flannery O'Connor by Brad Gooch. The Gooch. She was briefly famous as a child for teaching a chicken to walk backwards.

"I ain't worried what my underhead is doing." p. 171. I guess the underhead is subconscious, or maybe the thinking mind, or the observing ego. Who knows. I google scholar-ed it and came up with nothing. Tarwater is the kind of American that says he's going to do things and not talk about it. The introvert who has some thoughts, but doesn't want society to interfere with his vision of what he thinks he knows. A Trump supporter.

I'm not a Catholic (I'm a Buddhist), but I do sort of like her exploration of the wounded atheist struggling to fight off Christianity. Makes me think of my father, who points his fingers upward at god, and makes me think that he is strongly reacting against a repudiation of god. I'm just not interested enough to repudiate. To me god is either transcendental and remote or it's an evil activist god. God made free will and therefore isn't accountable to the evil in the world just slides back to the remote transcendental god that pressed the button but doesn't do anything else.

And I've spent my summers in the bible belt with Baptist and Episcopalian grandparents. So these southern gothic stories resonate with me, flesh out something I almost want to try and say. I felt a kind of sweetness in Wise Blood, perhaps something transcendentally spiritual or all-spiritual, that I can appreciate.

I also like the craft of her sentences. I never really knew what people meant when they said they liked the writing style. I like plain and simple, but it turns out plain and simple is not that easy and writing clearly is not that easy.

Links

Free electronic versions of the book

Comments

Character list of Inherent Vice the novel

Fay "Shasta" Hepworth played by Katherine Waterston in the 2014 movie Larry "Doc" Sportello: Our hero, gumsandal. Shasta Fay Hepworth: Former beautiful love interest. Mickey Wolfmann: Real estate tycoon, Shasta's sugar daddy, paying for apartment in Hancock Park. Mrs. Sloane Wolfmann: wife. Has her own side piece Mr. Riggs Warbling Deputy DA Penny Kimball: lawyer from district attorney office, who fooled around with Doc for a time. Works next to Rhus Frothingham (female book, male in movie). Aunt Reet: Aunt in real estate. "Bigfoot" Christian Bjornsen: Hollywood detective and actor. Married to Chastity. Spoiler: His partner Vincent Indelicato is wacked by Adrian Prussia, but Puck did the actual job. Mrs. Chastity Bjornsen: Gets on the phone on page 260 of the paperback to defend Bigfoot's day off from work. Calls Doc Mr. Moral Turpitude, accuses him of running up Bigfoot's mental health bills. Denis: friend who he goes and gets a pizza with

Democracy or democrazy?

Admittedly the choice between corrupt democrats and corrupt republicans isn't the political choice I want. I'd rather vote my way towards fairness, elimination of poverty, anti-trust laws that fight the consolidation of corporations (you read about grocery stores lately?), education, infrastructure. What you do get is a vote for democrats that vote to end rail strikes ( source ) because they can't carve out of the profits a sick leave, versus reality denying, Russian bought, obstructionists who might lower taxes, and want smaller government. The Ron Swanson's of the world who hate government and work in government. I've been running into people who believe the corrupt choices aren't worth even making. Reasons not to pay attention.I've thought that a few times in my life, but I don't think that now. There are real choices about health care for women, and even just an attitude towards democracy. It's hard to fight past the rhetoric, and understand eve

Consent

You couldn't have a better title to a memoir in these times. You can read about Humbert Humbert, and other male narratives, but the female narrative of the statutory rape is fulfilled by this book. I feel slightly ill while reading this book. What she goes through is off, and it's hard to put a finger on it besides Hebephilia . All the collaborating details from her mother, to her doctors, to her father. Vanessa Springora will be remembered for other things, she is a director and a publisher. I'm not sure if Gabriel Matzneff will be remembered for other things. At least not on this side of the pond. I do have a kind of jealousy for the appreciation of the intellectual life in France. Matzneff cites Lewis Carroll , and others as having the appreciation for youth. I read his Wikipedia page. That led to other questions about photographers who take pictures of their children. That led me down a creepy path. As much as Springora tries to not make it sexy, I wonder how many

Motley Kamuka

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