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[clapper clacking]
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[ducks quacking]
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[cows mooing]
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[soft music]
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[crutches on floor]
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[clothes hangers moving]
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[zipper]
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[paper rustling]
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[door shutting]
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[car starting]
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- This program is an
attempt to bring forward
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the most exciting
new books we know of.
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Such a book is a collection
of short stories,
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"A Good Man Is Hard to Find."
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One critic called her perhaps
the most naturally gifted
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of the youngest generation
of American novelists.
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Here she is, Flannery O'Connor.
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[upbeat music]
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- [Flannery] The grandmother
didn't want to go to Florida.
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She wanted to visit
some of her connections
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in East Tennessee and she was
seizing at every chance...
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- To change Bailey's mind.
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Bailey was the son she
lived with, her only boy.
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- [Flannery] "Now look
here, Bailey," she said,
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"see here, read this.
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Here this fellow that
calls himself The Misfit
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is a-loose from the federal
pen and headed toward Florida."
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- I love Southern writing.
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I particularly loved
Flannery O'Connor.
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You think it's this
bitter old alcoholic
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who's writing these
really funny dark stories,
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and then you find
out she's a woman
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and that she's
devoutly religious.
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- "I hope you don't think,"
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he said in a lofty
indignant tone,
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"that I believe in that crap."
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[typewriter keys clicking]
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- She was able to go
straight to the craziness
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without always trying to
make the craziness black
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or the craziness white.
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She just saw the mystery
of the craziness.
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- Flannery O'Connor's
life in some ways
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could have come out of a
Flannery O'Connor story.
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It was the illness I
think that made her
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the writer that she is.
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[soft music]
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- Flannery O'Connor
is one of the maybe
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five or six writers in
the history of the world
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who is least afraid to
look at the darkness.
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- You have a wolf
dressed up as a grandma.
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Something's going to happen.
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[soft music]
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[rooster crowing]
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[typewriter keys clicking]
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- [Narrator] "Whenever I'm asked
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why southern writers
particularly have a penchant
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for writing about freaks,
I say it is because
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we are still able
to recognize one."
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[upbeat music]
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- [Barker] All right, ladies
and gentlemen, step right up.
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[speaking drowned
out by crowd noise]
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- In a small town, you
can lie, you can steal,
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you can commit adultery, you
can even murder somebody,
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but you can't not go
to church. [laughs]
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[church bell ringing]
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[people chatting]
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[upbeat music]
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[dog barking]
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[marching band music]
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- Mary Flannery O'Connor was
born in Savannah, Georgia,
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into an Irish Catholic
immigrant community
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and she was in a
largely Protestant town,
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but a very cosmopolitan town.
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[upbeat music]
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- She's far more American
than she is Irish
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and she's far more southern
than she is American.
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- She was shy.
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I mean she was not timid,
and she was considered
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a little uppity by the nuns
in the parochial school
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she attended in Savannah.
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She had a rather
fortunate childhood,
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a very fortunate childhood.
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Her father adored her, and
so did her mother of course.
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But they saw her in
quite different ways
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and she was able to see
herself in different ways.
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- [Narrator] "When I was five
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I had an experience
that marked me for life.
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Pathe News sent a
photographer from New York
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to Savannah to take a picture
of a chicken of mine."
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- [Newsreader] Here's Mary
O'Connor of Savannah, Georgia
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holding the only
chicken in the world
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that actually walks backwards.
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When she advances, she retreats.
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To go forward, she goes back,
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and when she arrives,
she's really leaving.
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- You'd see her at age
five calm and in charge.
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I mean, there's
something about her
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that's bewitching at that age.
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She came back to
this incident often.
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She began to raise
these special birds.
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[birds honking]
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She would joke about how she
would then begin to raise
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one eyed chickens to try
to lure the film company
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to come back to town,
but they never did.
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[geese honking]
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[typewriter keys clicking]
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[upbeat music]
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- I would say her
signature story
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is "A Temple of the Holy Ghost,"
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because it envisions
this young girl
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who is clearly a version
of Flannery O'Connor.
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- The story is very provocative
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in exactly the way that
O'Connor's stories usually are.
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For one thing, she incorporates
what she calls a freak.
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A person who is not
like everybody else,
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a person who is
radically non-conformist.
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[girls singing in Latin]
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Two visiting cousins
go to see at the fair,
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this intersex person.
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- The two girls are
singing in Latin.
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They're Catholic girls,
they go to Catholic school.
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The boys in the town,
they call it juicing.
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[girls singing in Latin]
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- The child in the story
is too young to go,
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so she doesn't actually
get to see the person,
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but she is fascinated
by this idea
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of someone who can be
both male and female
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and yet neither male nor female.
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This child's faith
life is in some ways
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a version of Flannery's
own faith life
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in which she has doubts.
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- [Narrator] "He could
strike you this way,
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but he has not, amen."
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- She decides "I could
never be a saint,"
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but she could be a martyr
if they killed her quick.
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And then she thinks
about the ways
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in which she would
be willing to die.
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Boiled in oil, maybe,
attacked by animals,
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probably being torn
apart by animals.
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[lion growling]
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- if you went to mass,
you heard those prayers
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over and over again.
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You were encouraged
to pray silently,
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even oddly to contemplate
at a very young age.
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- [Narrator] "Her mind began
to get quiet and then empty.
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But when the priest
raised the monstrance
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00:09:04,716 --> 00:09:08,651
with the host shining ivory
colored in the center of it,
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she was thinking of
the tent at the fair
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that had the freak in it.
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You are God's imp,
don't you know."
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- What's happening here
is something so remarkable
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that the profane
meets with the sacred
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and it's within that
comic meeting that
the stories operate.
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This is the way
Flannery O'Connor works.
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You either get it or you don't,
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and if you don't, then
don't go to the carnival.
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- [Narrator] "God's spirit
has a dwelling in you,
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don't you know.
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Amen."
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♪ Oh you go to your church
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♪ And I'll go to mine
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♪ But let's walk
along together ♪
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00:10:03,879 --> 00:10:08,538
♪ Our Heavenly
Father is the same ♪
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♪ So let's walk along together
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- What does a writer try
to do in a short story?
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00:10:16,857 --> 00:10:19,411
Or what does a writer
try to do in a novel?
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What is the secret of writing?
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- Well, I think that a
serious fiction writer
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describes an action only in
order to reveal a mystery
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because he may be revealing
the mystery to himself,
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at the same time that he's
revealing it to everyone else
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and he may not even succeed
in revealing it to himself,
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but I think he must
sense its presence.
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- Her father, he was
a man like many people
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I know of that generation.
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He simply couldn't make it.
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The old economies in the
south had just collapsed.
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Since she was in
Faulkner's generation.
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The cities were where
things were happening.
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- They moved from
Savannah to Atlanta
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because that's where
he could get work.
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Flannery did not like it
there, nor did her mother.
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Regina, her mother
and Flannery relocated
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to Milledgeville to the
Cline family mansion.
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Edward would come home and
visit them on weekends,
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but they were used
to living without him
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for five days a week.
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- Regina had grown
up in rather genteel
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00:11:32,381 --> 00:11:35,522
circumstances in Milledgeville.
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Her family, the Cline family
where a very prominent
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family in the town, much
respected by other people there.
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One of the very few
Roman Catholic families.
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The little church
there may have been
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largely paid for by
one of her ancestors.
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[muffled choir singing]
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[priest speaking softly]
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00:12:03,999 --> 00:12:06,208
- Her mother had 15
brothers and sisters,
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00:12:06,208 --> 00:12:08,555
and a number of them
still lived in the house.
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00:12:08,555 --> 00:12:10,419
Miss Mary still lived there.
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Mr. Hugh, Miss Kate who
Flannery called the Duchess.
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Some great aunts.
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00:12:15,493 --> 00:12:19,980
So she was used to people
getting sick, dying, strokes.
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00:12:19,980 --> 00:12:22,742
She always had a strong
sense of mortality.
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[upbeat music]
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00:12:33,131 --> 00:12:34,961
- The O'Connors had no money.
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00:12:34,961 --> 00:12:38,654
The money came from Aunt Mary
who had had inherited money
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00:12:38,654 --> 00:12:41,139
and had land and these
were not integrationists,
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00:12:41,139 --> 00:12:42,002
I can tell you.
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00:12:44,625 --> 00:12:49,596
The Jews of Charleston
married the Jews of Savannah.
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00:12:51,046 --> 00:12:52,979
So the Catholics married the
Catholics of Milledgeville
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00:12:52,979 --> 00:12:55,360
married the Catholics of
Savannah, Augusta, so forth.
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00:13:03,403 --> 00:13:04,956
The time that Flannery lived,
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00:13:04,956 --> 00:13:08,891
the three Ks were always
Koons, kikes and Catholics.
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00:13:08,891 --> 00:13:12,964
That is African-Americans,
Jews and Catholics.
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00:13:14,448 --> 00:13:16,416
- Catholics were very suspect.
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00:13:16,416 --> 00:13:20,040
So there was a kind of siege
mentality by Catholics.
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00:13:20,040 --> 00:13:23,112
But this was good for
Flannery because it meant
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00:13:23,112 --> 00:13:28,014
that she didn't take for
granted widespread approval.
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00:13:28,014 --> 00:13:30,637
She ignored the disapproval
of her religion.
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00:13:30,637 --> 00:13:33,157
She ignored the
disapproval of her fiction.
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00:13:40,785 --> 00:13:43,339
- If you look at her
in that direction,
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00:13:43,339 --> 00:13:47,965
you don't get this kind
of romantic artist.
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00:13:47,965 --> 00:13:50,899
You get someone who's writing
out of a specific time,
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00:13:50,899 --> 00:13:54,834
a specific code and a
specific set of manners.
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00:13:54,834 --> 00:13:57,077
And the interesting
thing is what she found
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00:13:57,077 --> 00:13:59,700
in all those
manners was mystery.
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00:13:59,700 --> 00:14:02,048
[soft music]
228
00:14:16,165 --> 00:14:17,753
- Flannery's father was the one
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00:14:17,753 --> 00:14:19,928
who encouraged her
literary ambitions.
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00:14:19,928 --> 00:14:23,103
Her mother was interested
in improving her.
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00:14:23,103 --> 00:14:26,210
Corrective shoes,
braces, everything.
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00:14:27,659 --> 00:14:30,352
The father on the other
hand, liked her as she was.
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00:14:31,801 --> 00:14:35,012
- Ed O'Connor is a
sensitive charismatic man
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00:14:35,012 --> 00:14:37,842
who really went for her
work and her cartoons
235
00:14:37,842 --> 00:14:40,017
and her writing
and her creativity.
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00:14:40,017 --> 00:14:42,329
Her father would carry
around with him every day
237
00:14:42,329 --> 00:14:44,366
these little drawings
and things that she made
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00:14:44,366 --> 00:14:45,539
and show them to people.
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He was very proud of them.
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00:14:51,580 --> 00:14:52,995
- Her drawings are
marvelous.
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00:14:53,616 --> 00:14:55,066
These sharp faces.
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00:14:58,035 --> 00:14:59,415
Flannery would
write to her father,
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00:14:59,415 --> 00:15:01,245
little letters in the house,
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00:15:01,245 --> 00:15:04,213
and they'd be under the
napkins at breakfast.
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00:15:04,213 --> 00:15:05,766
And then he would write
her little letters back.
246
00:15:07,699 --> 00:15:09,149
- He had wanted
to write himself,
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00:15:09,149 --> 00:15:11,289
as she noted in
one of her letters.
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00:15:15,328 --> 00:15:19,642
She was 12 when he fell
ill, 15 when she lost him.
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00:15:23,267 --> 00:15:24,475
And he died from lupus.
250
00:15:26,339 --> 00:15:28,306
They had no treatment for lupus.
251
00:15:31,861 --> 00:15:34,243
[soft music]
252
00:15:41,043 --> 00:15:43,321
- The death of Edward
O'Connor, no doubt,
253
00:15:43,321 --> 00:15:47,636
was a major turning
point in her life.
254
00:15:47,636 --> 00:15:49,189
Up until that time, she had had
255
00:15:49,189 --> 00:15:51,881
a reasonably happy childhood.
256
00:15:51,881 --> 00:15:54,712
She was much loved.
She was an only child.
257
00:15:54,712 --> 00:15:57,887
She had the full attention
of both of her parents,
258
00:15:57,887 --> 00:16:01,374
and the loss of that suddenly
was a huge void for her.
259
00:16:04,929 --> 00:16:07,587
- "I suppose what I
mean about my father
260
00:16:07,587 --> 00:16:10,762
is that he would've written
well if he could have.
261
00:16:11,971 --> 00:16:14,628
Needing people badly
and not getting them
262
00:16:14,628 --> 00:16:17,459
may turn you in a
creative direction.
263
00:16:17,459 --> 00:16:20,393
He needed the people,
I guess and got them
264
00:16:20,393 --> 00:16:23,327
or rather wanted
them and got them.
265
00:16:23,327 --> 00:16:25,570
I wanted them and didn't."
266
00:16:27,296 --> 00:16:29,712
[soft music]
267
00:16:36,271 --> 00:16:38,998
[birds chirping]
268
00:16:43,933 --> 00:16:45,763
[typewriter keys clicking]
269
00:16:45,763 --> 00:16:48,662
- [Narrator] "Anybody who
survived his childhood
270
00:16:48,662 --> 00:16:51,010
has enough
information about life
271
00:16:51,010 --> 00:16:53,667
to last him the
rest of his days."
272
00:16:53,667 --> 00:16:57,223
[typewriter keys clicking]
273
00:17:00,157 --> 00:17:03,677
♪ Praise the Lord and
pass the ammunition ♪
274
00:17:03,677 --> 00:17:07,267
♪ Praise the Lord and
pass the ammunition ♪
275
00:17:07,267 --> 00:17:10,477
♪ Praise the Lord and
pass the ammunition ♪
276
00:17:10,477 --> 00:17:13,929
♪ And we'll all stay free
277
00:17:13,929 --> 00:17:17,036
[upbeat jazzy music]
278
00:17:19,176 --> 00:17:23,145
[speaking drowned out by music]
279
00:17:26,321 --> 00:17:28,495
- Flannery O'Connor
started doing her writing
280
00:17:28,495 --> 00:17:30,877
during World War II
when she was a student
281
00:17:30,877 --> 00:17:33,638
in Milledgeville at the Georgia
State College for Women.
282
00:17:37,953 --> 00:17:40,231
There was actually an
interesting important moment.
283
00:17:40,231 --> 00:17:42,095
She was in a women's college.
284
00:17:42,095 --> 00:17:46,168
Most of the men were
away fighting the war.
285
00:17:46,168 --> 00:17:48,998
- The women professors
here were encouraging
286
00:17:48,998 --> 00:17:51,622
the female students to think
about the various things
287
00:17:51,622 --> 00:17:53,934
that they could do
with their lives,
288
00:17:53,934 --> 00:17:56,696
and Flannery picked
up on, it's about
289
00:17:56,696 --> 00:17:58,387
how the world was changing.
290
00:17:58,387 --> 00:18:00,976
[upbeat music]
291
00:18:05,049 --> 00:18:08,328
- [Sally Fitzgerald] She was
very gifted as a caricaturists
292
00:18:08,328 --> 00:18:10,054
and you could see
that from the work.
293
00:18:10,054 --> 00:18:11,504
[person whistles]
294
00:18:11,504 --> 00:18:12,988
- [Brad Gooch] She does cartoons
which were then published
295
00:18:12,988 --> 00:18:15,439
in the student newspaper
and in the yearbook
296
00:18:15,439 --> 00:18:17,786
about life on campus,
but they're not
297
00:18:17,786 --> 00:18:22,756
happy prom sorority
visions of life on campus
298
00:18:27,761 --> 00:18:28,693
- [Narrator] "Oh,
don't worry about
299
00:18:28,693 --> 00:18:30,316
not getting on the Dean's list.
300
00:18:31,731 --> 00:18:34,182
It's no fun going to the
picture show at night anyway."
301
00:18:36,908 --> 00:18:38,772
- [Brad Gooch] When the
Waves are on campus,
302
00:18:38,772 --> 00:18:41,672
who were navy women,
she makes fun of them
303
00:18:41,672 --> 00:18:44,951
as if they're an occupying
force taking over the campus.
304
00:18:46,228 --> 00:18:50,301
This early sensibility
is both sarcastic,
305
00:18:50,301 --> 00:18:55,064
empathetic, and funny
and weird all at once.
306
00:18:55,064 --> 00:18:58,137
[bowstring twanging]
307
00:18:58,137 --> 00:18:59,655
- [Sally Fitzgerald] She
thought she wanted to be
308
00:18:59,655 --> 00:19:03,832
a serious writer who would
support herself by cartoons.
309
00:19:04,798 --> 00:19:06,041
- [Brad Gooch] She actually has
310
00:19:06,041 --> 00:19:08,112
great ambitions
for her cartoons.
311
00:19:08,112 --> 00:19:09,803
She would send them
to the New Yorker
312
00:19:09,803 --> 00:19:13,531
when James Thurber was the
great New Yorker cartoonist.
313
00:19:13,531 --> 00:19:16,120
[upbeat music]
314
00:19:21,643 --> 00:19:23,369
- She kept an orderly journal,
315
00:19:23,369 --> 00:19:25,164
which she called
higher mathematics.
316
00:19:26,958 --> 00:19:29,271
What she did was very
interesting because we learned
317
00:19:29,271 --> 00:19:33,206
so much about her, how she
felt about her shyness.
318
00:19:33,206 --> 00:19:36,278
She said "sometimes I think
I would give it all up,
319
00:19:36,278 --> 00:19:38,453
for just a little social ease."
320
00:19:40,006 --> 00:19:43,043
- [Narrator] "One new
quarter of college begun.
321
00:19:43,043 --> 00:19:46,288
I achieved enough
success in English 360
322
00:19:46,288 --> 00:19:48,670
by making a rather
humorous remark
323
00:19:48,670 --> 00:19:51,983
and then not laughing at
it while the others did.
324
00:19:51,983 --> 00:19:55,987
This is the sort of me
I strive to build up.
325
00:19:55,987 --> 00:19:59,508
The cool, sophisticated,
clever wit.
326
00:19:59,508 --> 00:20:03,443
The inarticulate confused
blunderer overwhelms
327
00:20:03,443 --> 00:20:06,550
the CSCW most of the time."
328
00:20:07,723 --> 00:20:10,312
[upbeat music]
329
00:20:12,349 --> 00:20:14,040
- She would never call
herself a feminist,
330
00:20:14,040 --> 00:20:16,560
but she saw what her
classmates were doing.
331
00:20:16,560 --> 00:20:20,288
She could leave mother,
she could become
332
00:20:20,288 --> 00:20:23,567
a political cartoonist
and have a career.
333
00:20:24,775 --> 00:20:26,397
- [Narrator] "Today,
I envision myself
334
00:20:26,397 --> 00:20:30,884
as a cartoonist block
printer of national repute.
335
00:20:30,884 --> 00:20:34,992
I'll make $400,000 before
graduating from college
336
00:20:34,992 --> 00:20:38,582
and with it in tow, prepare
for the leisurely life
337
00:20:38,582 --> 00:20:41,274
of a lethargic
scholar and traveler."
338
00:20:44,035 --> 00:20:46,175
- [Marshall Bruce] She
knew that was going outside
339
00:20:46,175 --> 00:20:49,282
the usual prescribed
roles for a woman.
340
00:20:51,111 --> 00:20:52,768
- [Brad Gooch] In
these early cartoons,
341
00:20:52,768 --> 00:20:56,669
you can almost see, weirdly,
O'Connor's aesthetic intact.
342
00:20:59,223 --> 00:21:01,777
- [Narrator] "Today
I'm devoted to realism.
343
00:21:01,777 --> 00:21:04,021
I will become a realist.
344
00:21:04,021 --> 00:21:08,267
I will take note of the
things around me accurately.
345
00:21:08,267 --> 00:21:12,409
I wonder if some of these
mental, emotional, social things
346
00:21:12,409 --> 00:21:15,204
that are happening to me and
the people have around me
347
00:21:15,204 --> 00:21:18,207
could crystallize into a novel.
348
00:21:18,207 --> 00:21:20,520
I must write a novel."
349
00:21:20,520 --> 00:21:23,109
[upbeat music]
350
00:21:36,156 --> 00:21:39,712
[typewriter keys clicking]
351
00:21:43,129 --> 00:21:45,683
- The writing program there
was very high powered,
352
00:21:45,683 --> 00:21:48,203
I suppose it was the most
famous in the country
353
00:21:48,203 --> 00:21:52,966
and Flannery found herself
in a literary hotbed.
354
00:21:54,727 --> 00:21:58,455
- There is no Flannery O'Connor
without leaving Georgia.
355
00:21:59,973 --> 00:22:04,564
She's around people who get
her maybe for the first time.
356
00:22:06,325 --> 00:22:11,295
She gets exposed to
literature, I think in a way
357
00:22:12,158 --> 00:22:13,711
that she never had been before.
358
00:22:15,195 --> 00:22:18,716
I think maybe at Iowa is
the first time she didn't
359
00:22:18,716 --> 00:22:21,581
feel like the absolutely
smartest person in the room.
360
00:22:22,789 --> 00:22:24,826
- Paul Engle had just
started a very important
361
00:22:24,826 --> 00:22:28,105
writers program, attracting
all these soldiers
362
00:22:28,105 --> 00:22:30,176
coming back from World
War II who wanted
363
00:22:30,176 --> 00:22:32,040
to write the great
American novel.
364
00:22:34,870 --> 00:22:38,736
Southern fiction
was the hot fiction
365
00:22:38,736 --> 00:22:42,740
and William Faulkner was
the great modernist writer.
366
00:22:44,432 --> 00:22:46,399
- She said to herself,
she'd never read Faulkner,
367
00:22:47,573 --> 00:22:50,714
never read Kafka and never read
368
00:22:50,714 --> 00:22:52,750
any of the southern writers.
369
00:22:52,750 --> 00:22:54,787
These were all new to her.
370
00:22:54,787 --> 00:22:57,652
- The men in the class
were making fun of her
371
00:22:57,652 --> 00:23:01,380
for her writing and also
for her southern accent.
372
00:23:02,795 --> 00:23:05,901
Whenever I spoke to
someone about O'Connor who
373
00:23:05,901 --> 00:23:07,420
had been at Iowa
Writer's Workshop,
374
00:23:07,420 --> 00:23:10,216
they always mentioned
this accent as something
375
00:23:10,216 --> 00:23:12,908
so completely foreign
and incomprehensible
376
00:23:12,908 --> 00:23:14,945
as if she were
speaking Mandarin.
377
00:23:14,945 --> 00:23:18,017
- Workshops can be
pretty brutal. [laughs]
378
00:23:19,121 --> 00:23:21,020
- She was very shy.
379
00:23:21,020 --> 00:23:22,815
People who were
there, thought maybe
380
00:23:22,815 --> 00:23:24,403
she wouldn't be
much of a writer,
381
00:23:24,403 --> 00:23:26,819
but the professors
at the workshop
382
00:23:26,819 --> 00:23:29,338
instantly knew that
she was talented.
383
00:23:30,995 --> 00:23:34,274
- They would tend to
pick Flannery's work
384
00:23:34,274 --> 00:23:38,140
out of the pile of student
work and sort of recognize
385
00:23:38,140 --> 00:23:41,178
this tone and this idiom
in which she was writing,
386
00:23:41,178 --> 00:23:44,561
to the annoyance of some
of her fellow male students
387
00:23:44,561 --> 00:23:47,149
who didn't understand why
she was getting attention.
388
00:23:48,288 --> 00:23:51,533
- Paul Engle recognized
her talent at once
389
00:23:51,533 --> 00:23:55,157
and immediately began to
make a reading list for her.
390
00:23:55,157 --> 00:23:56,504
And she'd drank it in.
391
00:23:56,504 --> 00:23:58,229
She read Henry James.
392
00:23:58,229 --> 00:24:02,095
She read the
Russians. Dostoevsky.
393
00:24:02,095 --> 00:24:04,166
She read everything
at that point.
394
00:24:04,166 --> 00:24:05,858
Then she knew what
she wanted to do.
395
00:24:07,929 --> 00:24:09,896
- One of the things O'Connor
is trying to figure out
396
00:24:09,896 --> 00:24:11,967
while she's here at Iowa
is not only how to be
397
00:24:11,967 --> 00:24:15,592
a good writer, but how to be
a faithful Catholic writer.
398
00:24:15,592 --> 00:24:18,387
What does it mean to put
these two seemingly disparate
399
00:24:18,387 --> 00:24:20,769
parts of her life and
her personality together?
400
00:24:22,115 --> 00:24:24,635
[soft music]
401
00:24:24,635 --> 00:24:27,051
- If you take a look
at the prayer journal,
402
00:24:27,051 --> 00:24:30,848
her transcribed prayers that
she was even copying out
403
00:24:30,848 --> 00:24:33,161
while she was in graduate
school, she was spending
404
00:24:33,161 --> 00:24:35,715
a surprising amount
of time talking to God
405
00:24:35,715 --> 00:24:37,993
about the subconscious
and the unconscious
406
00:24:39,581 --> 00:24:42,101
- [Brad Gooch] Instead of
going to the tavern every night
407
00:24:42,101 --> 00:24:44,621
with the students, she went
every morning to church.
408
00:24:44,621 --> 00:24:47,140
And she worried over and
even asked the priest
409
00:24:47,140 --> 00:24:50,592
about dealing with race
in her work, writing about
410
00:24:50,592 --> 00:24:53,768
these characters, prostitutes
and things like that.
411
00:24:53,768 --> 00:24:55,977
She was trying to work
out, almost sweetly
412
00:24:55,977 --> 00:24:57,979
and innocently, her Catholicism.
413
00:25:01,879 --> 00:25:03,122
- [Narrator] "Oh dear God,
414
00:25:03,122 --> 00:25:06,401
I want to write a
novel, a good novel.
415
00:25:07,851 --> 00:25:11,786
I want to do this for a good
feeling and for a bad one.
416
00:25:11,786 --> 00:25:16,722
The bad one is uppermost,
the psychologists say
417
00:25:16,722 --> 00:25:18,206
it is a natural one."
418
00:25:22,382 --> 00:25:26,352
- She's completely
humble in her enterprise.
419
00:25:26,352 --> 00:25:29,044
You see it in her
prayer journal.
420
00:25:29,044 --> 00:25:32,703
She's not trying to put herself
forward as the storyteller,
421
00:25:35,223 --> 00:25:38,157
as the wise woman,
as the clever girl.
422
00:25:40,366 --> 00:25:43,127
"I must write down that
I am to be an artist,
423
00:25:43,127 --> 00:25:45,923
not in the sense of
aesthetic frippery,
424
00:25:45,923 --> 00:25:48,719
but in the sense of
aesthetic craftsmanship.
425
00:25:48,719 --> 00:25:52,309
Otherwise I will feel my
loneliness continually,
426
00:25:52,309 --> 00:25:53,310
like this today.
427
00:25:55,139 --> 00:25:57,970
I do not want to be
lonely all my life,
428
00:25:57,970 --> 00:26:01,698
but people only make us lonelier
by reminding us of God."
429
00:26:04,563 --> 00:26:05,805
It's unbelievable.
430
00:26:05,805 --> 00:26:07,704
- How is she going
to find the stories
431
00:26:07,704 --> 00:26:10,327
that she knows she needs to tell
432
00:26:10,327 --> 00:26:11,984
and how is she
going to tell them?
433
00:26:13,364 --> 00:26:15,539
And that's really the question
that she's asking God,
434
00:26:16,816 --> 00:26:18,197
which is to say herself.
435
00:26:19,543 --> 00:26:21,925
[soft music]
436
00:26:24,548 --> 00:26:28,587
- It's a tremendous and
astonishing in some way,
437
00:26:28,587 --> 00:26:32,349
unmovable faith
that I don't think
438
00:26:32,349 --> 00:26:36,733
contemporary writers of
any kind could sustain.
439
00:26:39,287 --> 00:26:41,703
- [Hilton Als] I think
Flannery O'Connor's travels,
440
00:26:41,703 --> 00:26:43,256
I think they're vital.
441
00:26:43,256 --> 00:26:46,225
You don't know what home
is until you leave it.
442
00:26:49,193 --> 00:26:51,092
- [Narrator] "Dear God, I cannot
443
00:26:51,092 --> 00:26:52,714
love thee the way I want to.
444
00:26:54,129 --> 00:26:58,651
You are the slim crescent
of a moon that I see
445
00:26:58,651 --> 00:27:02,068
and myself is the earth's
shadow that keeps me
446
00:27:02,068 --> 00:27:04,415
from seeing all the moon."
447
00:27:09,593 --> 00:27:12,147
[upbeat music]
448
00:27:47,838 --> 00:27:50,530
- After being at the Writers
Workshop for three years,
449
00:27:50,530 --> 00:27:55,501
she was admitted to Yaddo, a
program in Saratoga Springs
450
00:27:56,640 --> 00:27:58,607
where writers famously
went and were able
451
00:27:58,607 --> 00:28:00,886
to devote themselves
to their writing.
452
00:28:02,439 --> 00:28:05,131
There was a kind of
southern renaissance.
453
00:28:05,131 --> 00:28:09,377
Truman Capote had been
there, Carson McCullers.
454
00:28:12,587 --> 00:28:16,349
She changes from Mary
Flannery to Flannery O'Connor
455
00:28:16,349 --> 00:28:20,768
in this period, partly to
escape the Southern double name
456
00:28:20,768 --> 00:28:24,081
and also because as a
writer in that period,
457
00:28:24,081 --> 00:28:27,809
being a woman writer
was already difficult.
458
00:28:29,293 --> 00:28:31,640
When she sent out some of her
first stories to magazines,
459
00:28:31,640 --> 00:28:33,884
she got at least one
rejection letter back
460
00:28:33,884 --> 00:28:35,783
addressed to Mr.
Flannery O'Connor.
461
00:28:39,200 --> 00:28:42,099
Yaddo was very connected
with a kind of bohemianism
462
00:28:42,099 --> 00:28:45,240
and most of the tales
of Yaddo are tales
463
00:28:45,240 --> 00:28:47,760
of Carson McCullers being drunk
464
00:28:47,760 --> 00:28:51,419
and everyone being
drunk apparently.
465
00:28:51,419 --> 00:28:54,940
- [Narrator] "This is
not sin but experience
466
00:28:54,940 --> 00:28:58,288
and if you do not sleep
with the opposite sex
467
00:28:58,288 --> 00:29:01,705
than it is assumed you
sleep with your own."
468
00:29:01,705 --> 00:29:06,641
- Her time at Yaddo was
intense and complicated.
469
00:29:07,987 --> 00:29:10,887
Lowell is there. Elizabeth
Hardwick's there.
470
00:29:10,887 --> 00:29:13,096
And she has a big
crush on Lowell
471
00:29:13,096 --> 00:29:16,133
in a way that's heartbreaking.
472
00:29:16,133 --> 00:29:18,964
He was very sexy,
very good looking,
473
00:29:18,964 --> 00:29:21,587
but he was with Elizabeth
Hardwick who was
474
00:29:21,587 --> 00:29:24,693
kind of a glamor girl,
also a southern girl.
475
00:29:24,693 --> 00:29:27,041
- It might have been
heady times for her
476
00:29:27,041 --> 00:29:31,390
to be a companion protege of
someone like Robert Lowell.
477
00:29:32,701 --> 00:29:35,497
- [Narrator] "You
ask about Cal Lowell.
478
00:29:35,497 --> 00:29:38,086
I feel almost too much
about him to be able
479
00:29:38,086 --> 00:29:40,364
to get to the heart of it.
480
00:29:40,364 --> 00:29:43,540
He is a kind of grief to me."
481
00:29:43,540 --> 00:29:44,990
- [Brad Gooch] In
his late twenties,
482
00:29:44,990 --> 00:29:47,509
he'd already won
a Pulitzer Prize.
483
00:29:48,683 --> 00:29:51,030
Lowell was haunted
by Christianity.
484
00:29:52,238 --> 00:29:54,516
He was almost
projecting onto O'Connor
485
00:29:54,516 --> 00:29:57,105
a kind of Catholic sainthood.
486
00:29:57,105 --> 00:29:58,348
- [Narrator] "I
watched him that winter
487
00:29:58,348 --> 00:30:00,591
come back into the church.
488
00:30:00,591 --> 00:30:02,214
I had nothing to do with it,
489
00:30:02,214 --> 00:30:05,562
but of course it was
a great joy to me."
490
00:30:05,562 --> 00:30:07,840
- [Brad Gooch] At the same
time that she was writing
491
00:30:07,840 --> 00:30:10,498
"Wise Blood," about a
Christ-haunted character
492
00:30:10,498 --> 00:30:13,156
who's also falling
apart all the time.
493
00:30:15,503 --> 00:30:17,746
- [Mary Gordon] He's
crazy. He's bipolar.
494
00:30:19,196 --> 00:30:22,613
He got her involved in this
anticommunist witch hunt.
495
00:30:24,443 --> 00:30:26,963
- [Brad Gooch] Lowell
decided that the director
496
00:30:26,963 --> 00:30:30,414
of the program had been
harboring a communist
497
00:30:30,414 --> 00:30:35,385
named Agnes Smedley and
then he accused her of this.
498
00:30:36,489 --> 00:30:39,182
He had O'Connor
testifying against her,
499
00:30:39,182 --> 00:30:41,149
which caused the
whole place to kind of
500
00:30:41,149 --> 00:30:42,771
blow apart for awhile.
501
00:30:43,911 --> 00:30:45,705
- The communist party
is the minority,
502
00:30:45,705 --> 00:30:47,259
but a dangerous minority.
503
00:30:47,259 --> 00:30:48,777
I believe that the entire nation
504
00:30:48,777 --> 00:30:51,332
should be alerted
to its menace today.
505
00:30:52,609 --> 00:30:54,162
- [Brad Gooch] Flannery
was walking through this
506
00:30:54,162 --> 00:30:57,269
kind of political
minefield that was going on
507
00:30:57,269 --> 00:30:58,718
in America at the time.
508
00:31:00,755 --> 00:31:01,860
- I hate communism.
509
00:31:03,068 --> 00:31:06,761
No concern whatever for
the individual person.
510
00:31:06,761 --> 00:31:10,938
- It came down to that
communism was atheistic
511
00:31:10,938 --> 00:31:13,630
and was against her religion.
512
00:31:13,630 --> 00:31:16,150
- Not the most admirable
moment of her life,
513
00:31:16,150 --> 00:31:19,429
but I think she would have done
anything he asked her to do.
514
00:31:19,429 --> 00:31:22,639
- [Brad Gooch] The upshot was
that they all had to leave.
515
00:31:22,639 --> 00:31:24,572
Sort of fine for
Elizabeth Hardwick who had
516
00:31:24,572 --> 00:31:27,402
an apartment in New York
and fine for Robert Lowell,
517
00:31:27,402 --> 00:31:30,716
but for Flannery O'Connor,
she now had no place to go.
518
00:31:32,649 --> 00:31:35,307
- [Narrator] "We have been
very upset at Yaddo lately
519
00:31:35,307 --> 00:31:38,448
and all the guests are
leaving in a group Tuesday.
520
00:31:38,448 --> 00:31:39,518
The revolution.
521
00:31:42,107 --> 00:31:44,799
I'll probably have to be
in New York a month or so
522
00:31:44,799 --> 00:31:47,112
and I'll be looking
for a place to stay.
523
00:31:48,389 --> 00:31:51,495
Oh, this has been very
disruptive to the book
524
00:31:51,495 --> 00:31:54,774
and it's changed my plans
entirely as I definitely
525
00:31:54,774 --> 00:31:57,536
won't be coming back to Yaddo."
526
00:31:57,536 --> 00:31:59,918
[soft music]
527
00:32:12,413 --> 00:32:15,726
[pen scratching]
528
00:32:15,726 --> 00:32:18,315
[cars and llama honking]
529
00:32:21,801 --> 00:32:24,459
- [Brad Gooch] O'Connor
was living in Manhattan.
530
00:32:24,459 --> 00:32:27,531
She made two trips
up to the Cloisters.
531
00:32:27,531 --> 00:32:30,810
There was an affinity
between her work
532
00:32:30,810 --> 00:32:33,917
and the medieval
aesthetic, and especially
533
00:32:33,917 --> 00:32:37,541
the mixing of the
spiritual with the ribald
534
00:32:37,541 --> 00:32:40,372
and the humorous and the
comic and the grotesque.
535
00:32:43,375 --> 00:32:45,342
- [Flannery] There were
reasons that intensified
536
00:32:45,342 --> 00:32:50,002
the grotesque quality of
some writing in these terms.
537
00:32:50,002 --> 00:32:53,868
I feel that the grotesque
quality of my own work
538
00:32:53,868 --> 00:32:56,388
is intensified by
the fact that I'm
539
00:32:56,388 --> 00:32:59,322
both a southern and
a Catholic writer.
540
00:33:00,530 --> 00:33:03,050
[upbeat music]
541
00:33:06,708 --> 00:33:08,917
- [Brad Gooch] Lowell
helpfully, maybe guiltily
542
00:33:08,917 --> 00:33:12,680
takes her to meet Robert
Fitzgerald, translator and poet
543
00:33:12,680 --> 00:33:14,958
and Sally Fitzgerald,
who then become
544
00:33:14,958 --> 00:33:17,374
O'Connor's really
closest friends
545
00:33:17,374 --> 00:33:20,101
and kind of a second
family for her.
546
00:33:21,551 --> 00:33:23,070
- One afternoon
the doorbell rang,
547
00:33:23,070 --> 00:33:26,383
and Cal was standing there
with a shy young woman
548
00:33:26,383 --> 00:33:28,178
in corduroy slacks
and navy peacoat.
549
00:33:29,559 --> 00:33:31,561
Flannery had been living
in a furnished room
550
00:33:31,561 --> 00:33:34,426
in someone's apartment up
on the Upper West Side.
551
00:33:34,426 --> 00:33:36,669
And she was pretty miserable.
552
00:33:36,669 --> 00:33:38,326
So we said, "Well, why don't
you come and live with us,
553
00:33:38,326 --> 00:33:39,638
and be our boarder?"
554
00:33:41,433 --> 00:33:45,333
[typewriter keys clicking]
555
00:33:45,333 --> 00:33:49,027
- And I think becomes a kind
of daughter of the house.
556
00:33:49,027 --> 00:33:52,754
I don't think she ever yearned
to be a wife or a mother.
557
00:33:52,754 --> 00:33:56,379
I think her female identity
was most importantly daughter.
558
00:33:59,520 --> 00:34:02,937
- Underlying all
that was the process
559
00:34:02,937 --> 00:34:04,456
of writing "Wise Blood."
560
00:34:04,456 --> 00:34:08,839
The struggle and the
rewriting and the rewriting.
561
00:34:08,839 --> 00:34:10,703
As young as she
was, she was still
562
00:34:10,703 --> 00:34:13,016
in her early twenties, I guess.
563
00:34:13,016 --> 00:34:14,604
Here's a big revelation.
564
00:34:15,984 --> 00:34:17,848
I think we all write
somewhere in our notebooks,
565
00:34:17,848 --> 00:34:20,058
"Oh, this is no good," you know?
566
00:34:21,473 --> 00:34:24,890
I think you can see in
her letters about working
567
00:34:24,890 --> 00:34:28,204
on "Wise Blood," and the
process that she went through,
568
00:34:29,412 --> 00:34:31,103
her first publisher
who didn't get it.
569
00:34:32,311 --> 00:34:35,866
- Flannery said that
the editor at Holt
570
00:34:35,866 --> 00:34:38,938
treats me like a
dim-witted campfire girl.
571
00:34:38,938 --> 00:34:41,803
- He called her
prematurely arrogant.
572
00:34:43,150 --> 00:34:45,013
- [Brad Gooch] And O'Connor,
very young, I mean,
573
00:34:45,013 --> 00:34:47,878
completely stands up for
herself and the possibility
574
00:34:47,878 --> 00:34:50,433
that this book will never
be published and just says
575
00:34:50,433 --> 00:34:52,400
that I'm not writing
this kind of novel.
576
00:34:53,746 --> 00:34:56,611
- [Sally Fitzgerald] Publishers
never intimidated her.
577
00:34:56,611 --> 00:34:59,027
- [Narrator] "I am not
writing a conventional novel,
578
00:34:59,027 --> 00:35:02,583
and I think that the
quality of the novel I write
579
00:35:02,583 --> 00:35:07,484
will derive precisely from the
peculiarity or the aloneness,
580
00:35:08,899 --> 00:35:11,316
if you will, of the
experience I write from."
581
00:35:12,213 --> 00:35:13,490
- She was very clear-eyed.
582
00:35:14,940 --> 00:35:16,183
You know, there are people
you take one look at,
583
00:35:16,183 --> 00:35:19,047
and you know, that's a
bum, or that's a liar.
584
00:35:20,428 --> 00:35:23,673
With her, it was,
that's an honest person.
585
00:35:25,502 --> 00:35:27,125
I published every
book she wrote.
586
00:35:30,887 --> 00:35:33,545
- One day she said,
"You know, I think I'd
587
00:35:33,545 --> 00:35:35,202
better see a doctor,
because I can't
588
00:35:35,202 --> 00:35:39,482
raise my arms to
the typewriter."
589
00:35:40,621 --> 00:35:42,174
I made the appointment
with the doctor.
590
00:35:42,174 --> 00:35:45,143
He said, "I suggest that when
you go back to Milledgeville,
591
00:35:45,143 --> 00:35:46,799
you check into the
hospital and have
592
00:35:46,799 --> 00:35:49,561
a complete physical
examination."
593
00:35:52,080 --> 00:35:54,911
- When she left New
York on the train,
594
00:35:56,154 --> 00:35:57,465
she wasn't feeling well.
595
00:35:59,916 --> 00:36:03,851
When Uncle Louis met her
at the station in Atlanta,
596
00:36:03,851 --> 00:36:08,580
he said that she looked like
she was a thousand years old.
597
00:36:08,580 --> 00:36:10,547
She was so sick.
598
00:36:11,997 --> 00:36:14,137
- Even when she knew
that she was sick,
599
00:36:14,137 --> 00:36:16,346
she thought she had arthritis.
600
00:36:16,346 --> 00:36:18,245
She kept expecting to come back.
601
00:36:19,798 --> 00:36:23,284
Doctor Arthur Merrill in
Atlanta recognized it.
602
00:36:23,284 --> 00:36:27,392
It sounds like lupus.
Bring her in here today.
603
00:36:28,289 --> 00:36:30,222
And when he saw her, he realized
604
00:36:30,222 --> 00:36:33,432
that it was lupus,
and it was advanced.
605
00:36:33,432 --> 00:36:35,469
He told her mother,
but her mother,
606
00:36:35,469 --> 00:36:38,265
knowing that the father had
died of the same disease,
607
00:36:38,265 --> 00:36:40,922
thought that the shock would
be too great for Flannery
608
00:36:40,922 --> 00:36:43,753
and decided not to tell her.
609
00:36:43,753 --> 00:36:46,411
Mrs. O'Connor told
us of this decision.
610
00:36:46,411 --> 00:36:48,516
Of course, we honored it.
611
00:36:48,516 --> 00:36:50,518
She lost her hair.
612
00:36:50,518 --> 00:36:53,659
She was rather disfigured
by the medicine.
613
00:36:55,074 --> 00:36:59,734
It could be combated, although
not cured, by cortisone.
614
00:36:59,734 --> 00:37:02,668
This is the way she was able
to live as long as she did.
615
00:37:03,876 --> 00:37:06,396
Flannery continued to
talk about her arthritis
616
00:37:06,396 --> 00:37:08,260
and the fact that she
was looking forward
617
00:37:08,260 --> 00:37:09,882
to getting back to Connecticut.
618
00:37:09,882 --> 00:37:13,438
Never did send for her books,
never sent for her clothes.
619
00:37:13,438 --> 00:37:15,129
- She never stopped writing.
620
00:37:15,129 --> 00:37:17,959
She was a good
stonemason, good artisan,
621
00:37:17,959 --> 00:37:19,513
so that way in everything.
622
00:37:19,513 --> 00:37:22,205
Virgil wrote a line a day.
623
00:37:22,205 --> 00:37:25,104
Flaubert wrote a paragraph a
day, but they were craftsmen.
624
00:37:25,104 --> 00:37:26,968
They weren't trying
to save the world.
625
00:37:29,385 --> 00:37:31,663
- [Narrator] "In a sense,
sickness is a place
626
00:37:31,663 --> 00:37:34,700
more instructive than
a long trip to Europe.
627
00:37:34,700 --> 00:37:37,116
It's a place where
there's no company,
628
00:37:37,116 --> 00:37:38,566
where nobody can follow."
629
00:37:42,294 --> 00:37:45,849
[typewriter keys clicking]
630
00:38:02,210 --> 00:38:05,248
[upbeat banjo music]
631
00:38:20,953 --> 00:38:21,885
- I'm a preacher.
632
00:38:23,301 --> 00:38:24,957
- What church?
633
00:38:24,957 --> 00:38:27,374
- Church of Truth
Without Christ.
634
00:38:28,582 --> 00:38:32,033
- Protestant? Or is
it something foreign?
635
00:38:32,033 --> 00:38:34,104
- Oh, no, ma'am,
it's Protestant.
636
00:38:34,104 --> 00:38:36,797
- People did not really
understand "Wise Blood"
637
00:38:36,797 --> 00:38:38,177
when it first came out.
638
00:38:38,177 --> 00:38:40,179
They all mistook her first book
639
00:38:40,179 --> 00:38:41,802
as being the work of a nihilist.
640
00:38:41,802 --> 00:38:44,667
- There ain't but one thing
that I want you to understand,
641
00:38:44,667 --> 00:38:46,841
and that's that I don't
believe in anything.
642
00:38:47,739 --> 00:38:48,809
- Nothing at all?
643
00:38:49,741 --> 00:38:51,432
- Nothing.
644
00:38:51,432 --> 00:38:52,916
- [Angela O'Donnell]
Primarily because Hazel Motes
645
00:38:52,916 --> 00:38:57,265
is one of O'Connor's characters
who is running away from God
646
00:38:57,990 --> 00:38:59,613
but is hounded by God.
647
00:39:00,786 --> 00:39:02,547
- Some preacher's
left his mark on you.
648
00:39:03,789 --> 00:39:04,721
- [Angela O'Donnell]
Always doing
649
00:39:04,721 --> 00:39:06,136
the most outrageous things.
650
00:39:06,136 --> 00:39:07,517
Going to a whorehouse,
651
00:39:07,517 --> 00:39:10,520
preaching the church of
Christ without Christ.
652
00:39:10,520 --> 00:39:13,661
- The church without
Christ don't have a Jesus.
653
00:39:15,042 --> 00:39:16,871
- [Angela O'Donnell] Murdering
people in the street.
654
00:39:21,428 --> 00:39:23,291
And yet, every time
he turns around,
655
00:39:23,291 --> 00:39:25,432
there's that ragged figure
that's following him,
656
00:39:25,432 --> 00:39:26,881
that's following him.
657
00:39:26,881 --> 00:39:29,263
- Why don't we go someplace
and have us some fun?
658
00:39:29,263 --> 00:39:31,679
- He can't estrange
God, and there's no way
659
00:39:31,679 --> 00:39:34,337
you could ever entirely
estrange yourself from God.
660
00:39:34,337 --> 00:39:38,030
So O'Connor understands
this. This is her theology.
661
00:39:38,030 --> 00:39:40,481
- There's no peace
for the redeemed.
662
00:39:40,481 --> 00:39:44,899
If they was three crosses
there, and Jesus Christ hung-
663
00:39:44,899 --> 00:39:47,385
- When I went to do her
first novel as a film,
664
00:39:47,385 --> 00:39:50,940
I in a very calculated
way, I chose a director
665
00:39:50,940 --> 00:39:52,459
who was an atheist.
666
00:39:52,459 --> 00:39:57,429
Because I did not want
some soppy religious thing,
667
00:39:57,429 --> 00:39:59,673
and she would have hated it.
668
00:39:59,673 --> 00:40:02,296
- When John Huston decided
to make a movie of it
669
00:40:02,296 --> 00:40:03,608
many, many years
later, I wondered,
670
00:40:03,608 --> 00:40:04,712
how is he going to do it?
671
00:40:04,712 --> 00:40:06,749
- Where you come from is gone.
672
00:40:08,198 --> 00:40:12,444
Where you thought you were
going to, weren't never there.
673
00:40:12,444 --> 00:40:13,894
- [Michael Fitzgerald] But
when she wrote the novel
674
00:40:13,894 --> 00:40:16,586
in my parents' house, my father
was at the time translating
675
00:40:18,036 --> 00:40:20,245
the Oedipus Rex of Sophocles,
which she had never read.
676
00:40:20,245 --> 00:40:22,385
[indistinct speaking]
677
00:40:22,385 --> 00:40:25,008
She was so shocked
by the Oedipus Rex
678
00:40:25,008 --> 00:40:28,184
that she reworked the
entire novel to accommodate
679
00:40:28,184 --> 00:40:30,497
Hazel Motes' blinding
himself, as Oedipus does.
680
00:40:32,740 --> 00:40:35,985
- There is where the
razor's edge of "Wise Blood"
681
00:40:35,985 --> 00:40:38,297
and Flannery
O'Connor really are.
682
00:40:39,782 --> 00:40:43,233
- [Woman] Mr. Motes, what's
that wire around you for?
683
00:40:43,233 --> 00:40:46,098
- How can a person
really be a saint?
684
00:40:46,098 --> 00:40:49,205
What kind of a saint would
that person be, she wondered?
685
00:40:49,205 --> 00:40:51,172
- Now I remember on
the last day, John,
686
00:40:51,172 --> 00:40:54,106
his hands over my shoulders
leaned in and said,
687
00:40:54,106 --> 00:40:57,075
"Ben, I think I've been had."
688
00:40:58,352 --> 00:41:00,906
By the end, he realized,
I've told another story
689
00:41:00,906 --> 00:41:02,701
than the one I
thought I was telling.
690
00:41:03,978 --> 00:41:06,464
I've told Flannery
O'Connor's story.
691
00:41:09,467 --> 00:41:12,090
- Huston kind of looks down,
and he looks up at everybody
692
00:41:12,090 --> 00:41:14,506
and looks around, and
he says, "Jesus wins."
693
00:41:17,198 --> 00:41:21,306
[people talking over each other]
694
00:41:24,378 --> 00:41:28,934
♪ I would sleep on
a bed of nails ♪
695
00:41:28,934 --> 00:41:33,629
♪ Til my back was
torn and bleeding ♪
696
00:41:33,629 --> 00:41:38,185
♪ In the deep darkness of hell
697
00:41:38,185 --> 00:41:42,741
♪ The Damascus of my meeting
698
00:41:42,741 --> 00:41:47,297
♪ I wanna get right with God
699
00:41:47,297 --> 00:41:52,233
♪ Yes, you know you got
to get right with God ♪
700
00:41:53,407 --> 00:41:55,064
- [Sally Fitzgerald]
It was admired.
701
00:41:55,064 --> 00:41:58,481
It was very much
admired, because its
power was undeniable.
702
00:41:58,481 --> 00:42:00,587
But critics didn't
understand it.
703
00:42:00,587 --> 00:42:02,278
- [Robert Giroux]
I'll tell you that
704
00:42:02,278 --> 00:42:04,936
the publishing point of view
was, this book is a flop.
705
00:42:04,936 --> 00:42:06,765
It got bad reviews.
706
00:42:06,765 --> 00:42:09,837
I was shocked at the
stupidity of these reviews,
707
00:42:09,837 --> 00:42:11,770
the lack of perception
or even the lack
708
00:42:11,770 --> 00:42:15,843
of having an open mind about it.
709
00:42:15,843 --> 00:42:18,397
- [Narrator] "Reviewing
time was terrible.
710
00:42:18,397 --> 00:42:20,745
Nearly gave me apoplexy.
711
00:42:20,745 --> 00:42:22,470
The one in the Atlanta Journal
712
00:42:22,470 --> 00:42:24,611
was so stupid, it was painful.
713
00:42:24,611 --> 00:42:26,026
It was written, I understand,
714
00:42:26,026 --> 00:42:28,753
by the lady who writes
about gardening.
715
00:42:28,753 --> 00:42:31,687
They shouldn't have taken
her away from the petunias."
716
00:42:34,482 --> 00:42:36,381
- At the autograph
party in Milledgeville,
717
00:42:36,381 --> 00:42:39,418
all the ladies came, and
they were all excited
718
00:42:39,418 --> 00:42:41,559
about this new author in town.
719
00:42:41,559 --> 00:42:45,770
They all walked away with
her book, "Wise Blood,"
720
00:42:45,770 --> 00:42:47,703
all autographed and everything.
721
00:42:49,325 --> 00:42:51,914
And I think she was just
kind of chuckling to herself
722
00:42:51,914 --> 00:42:54,779
as she saw them all
leave the room, thinking,
723
00:42:54,779 --> 00:42:56,953
oh, wait till they find out.
724
00:42:56,953 --> 00:42:59,335
Or wait till they really
see what it's all about.
725
00:43:00,508 --> 00:43:02,856
[soft music]
726
00:43:12,003 --> 00:43:16,214
- Bernard Cline, brother
of Regina, put together
727
00:43:16,214 --> 00:43:20,770
three tracts of land which
became Andalusia Farm.
728
00:43:21,875 --> 00:43:26,534
In 1951 when Flannery
became so ill,
729
00:43:26,534 --> 00:43:28,916
it was possible for
them to move out here.
730
00:43:32,540 --> 00:43:36,027
Regina continued to
run it as a dairy farm.
731
00:43:36,027 --> 00:43:39,168
They both could live
on the ground floor
732
00:43:39,168 --> 00:43:41,929
and not have to climb
stairs to the second floor.
733
00:43:43,759 --> 00:43:46,969
- [Brad Gooch] She was
confined on this farm,
734
00:43:46,969 --> 00:43:49,592
and she really
found her material
735
00:43:49,592 --> 00:43:51,629
around her in that setting.
736
00:43:54,252 --> 00:43:55,736
- [Sally Fitzgerald] She
realized that she didn't have to
737
00:43:55,736 --> 00:43:58,877
sit in New York and lose
her ear for southern speech,
738
00:43:58,877 --> 00:44:01,086
that she had it everywhere.
739
00:44:01,086 --> 00:44:03,433
The farm women, the farm people.
740
00:44:03,433 --> 00:44:05,366
Everything was
grist for her mill.
741
00:44:06,851 --> 00:44:11,096
- I think maybe the reason she
appeals to so many musicians
742
00:44:11,096 --> 00:44:15,273
is because she's one of those
writers who is best heard.
743
00:44:16,446 --> 00:44:19,104
- [Narrator] "Everything
is getting terrible.
744
00:44:19,104 --> 00:44:20,623
I remember the day
you could go off
745
00:44:20,623 --> 00:44:23,039
and leave your screen
door unlatched.
746
00:44:23,039 --> 00:44:23,971
Not no more."
747
00:44:25,386 --> 00:44:26,767
- One day, Flannery and I
748
00:44:26,767 --> 00:44:29,218
had driven over to
Milledgeville to do errands.
749
00:44:29,218 --> 00:44:32,497
She said something again
about her arthritis.
750
00:44:32,497 --> 00:44:36,225
I said, "Flannery, you
don't have arthritis.
751
00:44:36,225 --> 00:44:37,295
You have lupus."
752
00:44:38,745 --> 00:44:42,818
Her hand was shaking. My knee
was shaking on the clutch.
753
00:44:42,818 --> 00:44:46,614
We drove back up and down
the road, and a few minutes,
754
00:44:46,614 --> 00:44:50,791
she said, "Well,
that's not good news.
755
00:44:50,791 --> 00:44:54,346
But I can't thank you
enough for telling me.
756
00:44:54,346 --> 00:44:58,868
I thought I had lupus. And
I thought I was going crazy.
757
00:44:58,868 --> 00:45:01,457
And I'd a lot rather
be sick than crazy."
758
00:45:02,734 --> 00:45:05,461
- The disease that had
eaten her up and had,
759
00:45:05,461 --> 00:45:09,327
it was a great moment in
which the hope and everything
760
00:45:09,327 --> 00:45:12,330
she had, suddenly, the hope
of her writing and everything,
761
00:45:12,330 --> 00:45:14,850
suddenly hit her, that
she just may never
762
00:45:14,850 --> 00:45:16,852
get to do what she wanted to do.
763
00:45:16,852 --> 00:45:18,750
- [Sally Fitzgerald] This
was devastating knowledge.
764
00:45:18,750 --> 00:45:21,097
She expected to
live three years,
765
00:45:21,097 --> 00:45:22,961
which is what her
father had lived
766
00:45:22,961 --> 00:45:25,895
after his disease was diagnosed.
767
00:45:25,895 --> 00:45:28,760
- Going to Iowa, going
to that early success,
768
00:45:28,760 --> 00:45:31,418
living with the
Fitzgeralds, going to Yaddo,
769
00:45:31,418 --> 00:45:35,180
being part of that whole
little literary scene.
770
00:45:35,180 --> 00:45:38,632
And then being really
dragged out of it
771
00:45:38,632 --> 00:45:42,015
by the physical
constraints of her lupus.
772
00:45:43,257 --> 00:45:47,227
- After she got sick
and had to go home,
773
00:45:47,227 --> 00:45:49,539
she was a prisoner of her body.
774
00:45:49,539 --> 00:45:50,989
I think she loved
writing so much
775
00:45:50,989 --> 00:45:53,060
because it freed her
from the corporeal.
776
00:45:55,338 --> 00:45:58,376
- I think that it's
inevitable that her dark view
777
00:45:58,376 --> 00:46:03,105
of the body and not nature,
but the bodily world
778
00:46:03,105 --> 00:46:06,177
as being only a
source of dark things,
779
00:46:06,177 --> 00:46:09,007
has to be connected
to her lupus.
780
00:46:09,007 --> 00:46:13,978
The deformed body, the broken
body, the afflicted body
781
00:46:15,876 --> 00:46:19,224
is very much a theme
that recurs in her work.
782
00:46:23,125 --> 00:46:25,541
- In some ways, I
think we can say now,
783
00:46:25,541 --> 00:46:28,509
thank God for her suffering,
because it allowed her
784
00:46:28,509 --> 00:46:30,373
to produce the work
that she produced.
785
00:46:35,516 --> 00:46:38,865
- To know yourself is
to know your region
786
00:46:38,865 --> 00:46:41,281
and yet it's also
to know the world.
787
00:46:41,281 --> 00:46:43,766
And in a sense,
or paradoxically,
788
00:46:43,766 --> 00:46:46,804
it's also to be an
exile from that world.
789
00:46:48,702 --> 00:46:53,707
♪ Lord, a good man
is hard to find ♪
790
00:46:55,019 --> 00:46:59,989
♪ You always get another kind
791
00:47:01,232 --> 00:47:05,753
♪ Just when you think
that he's your pal ♪
792
00:47:07,548 --> 00:47:11,173
♪ You look and find
him foolin' round ♪
793
00:47:11,173 --> 00:47:13,969
♪ Some other gal
794
00:47:13,969 --> 00:47:16,695
[typewriter keys clicking]
795
00:47:16,695 --> 00:47:18,974
- [Sally Fitzgerald]
The first real story
796
00:47:18,974 --> 00:47:21,804
that was unquestionably
carrying the power
797
00:47:21,804 --> 00:47:23,254
that she would later show.
798
00:47:23,254 --> 00:47:27,879
- "A Good Man Is Hard To
Find" changed her reputation.
799
00:47:27,879 --> 00:47:31,814
- She got her back up,
earning her own voice
800
00:47:31,814 --> 00:47:36,819
and not caving to lupus
at that time in her life
801
00:47:37,993 --> 00:47:40,927
when she then had
no choice but to
802
00:47:40,927 --> 00:47:44,171
be there for her
work constantly.
803
00:47:44,171 --> 00:47:45,966
- Unlike what happened
with "Wise Blood,"
804
00:47:45,966 --> 00:47:48,900
which was incomprehension,
they had to go through
805
00:47:48,900 --> 00:47:51,592
several printings,
she comes to New York,
806
00:47:51,592 --> 00:47:55,631
is interviewed on television,
a kind of new popular medium,
807
00:47:55,631 --> 00:48:00,153
and has these great, glowing
reviews in the New York Times,
808
00:48:00,153 --> 00:48:02,086
and this really
establishes her then
809
00:48:02,086 --> 00:48:04,122
as an important American
writer, and especially
810
00:48:04,122 --> 00:48:07,677
a writer of her signature
genre, the short story.
811
00:48:07,677 --> 00:48:11,267
[typewriter keys clicking]
812
00:48:16,824 --> 00:48:20,035
- They're on their way
to Florida for vacation.
813
00:48:20,035 --> 00:48:22,658
And the grandmother is
sitting in the backseat
814
00:48:22,658 --> 00:48:24,177
with her two grandchildren.
815
00:48:25,626 --> 00:48:27,559
"'Tennessee is just a
hillbilly dumping ground,'
816
00:48:27,559 --> 00:48:31,184
John Wesley said. 'And Georgia
is a lousy state, too.'"
817
00:48:32,875 --> 00:48:34,739
- [Narrator] "Outside
of Toomsboro,
818
00:48:34,739 --> 00:48:37,949
she woke up and recalled
an old plantation
819
00:48:37,949 --> 00:48:40,296
that she had visited in
this neighborhood once
820
00:48:40,296 --> 00:48:41,884
when she was a young lady.
821
00:48:41,884 --> 00:48:44,473
' Oh, look at the cute
little pickaninny,' she said,
822
00:48:44,473 --> 00:48:45,888
and pointed to a Negro child
823
00:48:45,888 --> 00:48:48,408
standing in the door of a shack.
824
00:48:48,408 --> 00:48:53,102
'Wouldn't that make a
picture, now?' She asked."
825
00:48:53,102 --> 00:48:55,725
- The grandmother,
who in a sense
826
00:48:55,725 --> 00:48:58,245
is the central
character in the story,
827
00:48:58,245 --> 00:49:03,112
her vanity which literally
causes the catastrophe.
828
00:49:04,562 --> 00:49:06,978
- [Narrator] "'It's not much
farther,' the grandmother said.
829
00:49:06,978 --> 00:49:11,155
And just as she said it, a
horrible thought came to her.
830
00:49:11,155 --> 00:49:13,778
The thought was so
embarrassing that she turned
831
00:49:13,778 --> 00:49:16,643
red in the face,
and her eyes dilated
832
00:49:16,643 --> 00:49:20,923
and her feet jumped up,
upsetting her valise in the car.
833
00:49:20,923 --> 00:49:23,857
The instant the valise
moved, the newspaper top
834
00:49:23,857 --> 00:49:27,274
she had over the basket
under it, rose with a snarl
835
00:49:27,274 --> 00:49:31,934
and Pitty Sing the cat sprang
onto Bailey's shoulder.
836
00:49:31,934 --> 00:49:34,972
[car crashing]
837
00:49:34,972 --> 00:49:38,423
'We've had an accident,'
the children screamed
838
00:49:38,423 --> 00:49:40,494
in frenzy of delight.
839
00:49:40,494 --> 00:49:44,395
'But nobody's killed,' June
Star said with disappointment.
840
00:49:44,395 --> 00:49:47,053
The horrible thought she
had had before the accident
841
00:49:47,053 --> 00:49:50,642
was that the house she
had remembered so vividly
842
00:49:50,642 --> 00:49:53,128
was not in Georgia
but in Tennessee.
843
00:49:54,612 --> 00:49:57,684
In a few minutes they saw
a car some distance away
844
00:49:57,684 --> 00:50:01,446
on top of a hill, coming
slowly as if the occupants
845
00:50:01,446 --> 00:50:03,138
were watching them.
846
00:50:03,138 --> 00:50:06,382
The grandmother stood up and
waved both arms dramatically
847
00:50:06,382 --> 00:50:07,832
to attract their attention."
848
00:50:09,006 --> 00:50:11,318
- Because she had seen
newspaper accounts
849
00:50:11,318 --> 00:50:14,149
of the Misfit and most
of the other figures.
850
00:50:14,149 --> 00:50:16,254
- [Narrator] "'You're
The Misfit,' she said.
851
00:50:16,254 --> 00:50:19,464
'I recognized you at once.'
852
00:50:19,464 --> 00:50:22,329
'Yes'm,' the man said,
smiling slightly,
853
00:50:22,329 --> 00:50:25,505
as if he were pleased in
spite of himself to be known.
854
00:50:25,505 --> 00:50:28,542
'But it would have been
better for all of you, lady,
855
00:50:28,542 --> 00:50:30,717
if you hadn'ta recognized me.'"
856
00:50:31,683 --> 00:50:33,168
- And he's going to shoot her.
857
00:50:33,168 --> 00:50:35,929
But she said, "I know you're
not common and ordinary.
858
00:50:35,929 --> 00:50:37,724
I know you're a good man."
859
00:50:39,139 --> 00:50:41,314
- [Narrator] "There was a
piercing scream from the woods,
860
00:50:41,314 --> 00:50:44,213
followed closely
by a pistol report.
861
00:50:44,213 --> 00:50:47,872
'Lady,' The Misfit said,
looking far beyond her
862
00:50:47,872 --> 00:50:50,599
into the woods, 'there
never was a body
863
00:50:50,599 --> 00:50:52,635
that gives the undertaker a tip.
864
00:50:54,085 --> 00:50:56,674
Jesus was the only one
that ever raised the dead,'
865
00:50:56,674 --> 00:50:59,297
the Misfit continued, 'and
he shouldn't have done it.
866
00:50:59,297 --> 00:51:01,161
He thrown everything
off balance.
867
00:51:01,161 --> 00:51:02,818
If he did what he said, then
it's nothing for you to do
868
00:51:02,818 --> 00:51:06,235
but throw away everything and
follow him, and if he didn't,
869
00:51:06,235 --> 00:51:08,686
then it's nothing for you to
do but enjoy the few minutes
870
00:51:08,686 --> 00:51:12,172
you got left the best way
you can, by killing somebody
871
00:51:12,172 --> 00:51:13,691
or burning down
his house, or doing
872
00:51:13,691 --> 00:51:15,175
some other meanness to him.
873
00:51:15,175 --> 00:51:17,108
No pleasure but
meanness,' he said."
874
00:51:18,385 --> 00:51:19,593
- He's shot everybody else,
875
00:51:19,593 --> 00:51:21,423
and he's about to
shoot the grandmother.
876
00:51:22,872 --> 00:51:26,393
And for the first time
in her life, she gets it.
877
00:51:27,567 --> 00:51:28,913
- [Narrator] "'Why,
you're one of my babies.
878
00:51:28,913 --> 00:51:30,880
You're one of my own children.'
879
00:51:30,880 --> 00:51:33,435
She reached out and touched
him on the shoulder.
880
00:51:33,435 --> 00:51:36,507
Misfit sprang back as if
a snake had bitten him
881
00:51:36,507 --> 00:51:38,888
and shot her three times
through the chest."
882
00:51:38,888 --> 00:51:40,649
[gun firing]
883
00:51:40,649 --> 00:51:42,064
- And she dies quite happily.
884
00:51:43,203 --> 00:51:45,309
Flannery, of course, insisted
885
00:51:45,309 --> 00:51:49,485
that this is a
story about grace.
886
00:51:50,969 --> 00:51:55,388
A woman's sudden realization
of her kinship with a criminal.
887
00:51:56,941 --> 00:51:58,736
- The moment of violence is not
888
00:51:58,736 --> 00:52:01,325
where we recoil from each other,
889
00:52:01,325 --> 00:52:03,258
but when we are
connected to each other.
890
00:52:05,052 --> 00:52:06,640
- "'Take her off and throw
her where you'd thrown
891
00:52:06,640 --> 00:52:08,332
the others,' he said,
picking up the cat
892
00:52:08,332 --> 00:52:10,610
that was rubbing itself
against his leg."
893
00:52:10,610 --> 00:52:11,921
[cat meows]
894
00:52:11,921 --> 00:52:13,406
- [Narrator] "'She was
a talker, wasn't she?'
895
00:52:13,406 --> 00:52:15,822
Bobby Lee said, sliding down
the ditch with the yodel."
896
00:52:17,272 --> 00:52:18,825
- "She would have been a
good woman if it had been
897
00:52:18,825 --> 00:52:20,965
someone there to shoot her
every minute of her life,"
898
00:52:20,965 --> 00:52:22,794
and well, most of us would be.
899
00:52:23,968 --> 00:52:27,074
[soft music]
900
00:52:27,074 --> 00:52:29,732
[birds calling]
901
00:52:46,715 --> 00:52:48,303
- [Host] I understand
you're living on a farm.
902
00:52:48,303 --> 00:52:53,239
- Yes, I only live on one
though. I don't see much of it.
903
00:52:54,516 --> 00:52:57,277
I'm a writer, and I farm
from the rocking chair.
904
00:52:58,727 --> 00:53:01,143
[soft music]
905
00:53:33,486 --> 00:53:36,730
- [Brad Gooch] Because she was
ill and she was on crutches,
906
00:53:36,730 --> 00:53:38,663
everything had to be precise.
907
00:53:38,663 --> 00:53:41,148
There was only so much
energy that could be given.
908
00:53:43,358 --> 00:53:46,740
- I knew Flannery for quite
a while when she was ill,
909
00:53:46,740 --> 00:53:48,570
and she was on crutches.
910
00:53:48,570 --> 00:53:51,400
And I never heard her complain.
911
00:53:51,400 --> 00:53:54,403
She was very adept at
getting around on them.
912
00:53:54,403 --> 00:53:57,441
I never saw her wince in pain.
913
00:53:57,441 --> 00:54:01,065
She just was, as far as I could
see, always in a good humor.
914
00:54:02,963 --> 00:54:04,448
- [Narrator] "I'm
making out fine,
915
00:54:04,448 --> 00:54:07,520
in spite of any
conflicting stories.
916
00:54:07,520 --> 00:54:09,694
I have enough energy
to write with,
917
00:54:09,694 --> 00:54:13,733
and as that is all I have
any business doing anyhow,
918
00:54:13,733 --> 00:54:17,288
I can with one eye squinting
take it all as a blessing."
919
00:54:18,841 --> 00:54:23,294
- Flannery and Regina went
to mass every morning,
920
00:54:23,294 --> 00:54:25,848
usually at seven o'clock which
was the only mass there was.
921
00:54:25,848 --> 00:54:28,299
You know, the Catholics
were very few in number.
922
00:54:30,094 --> 00:54:32,061
- Flannery worked every morning,
923
00:54:32,061 --> 00:54:35,030
from I guess she
started around nine.
924
00:54:35,030 --> 00:54:37,343
But you couldn't go
there before 11:30.
925
00:54:37,343 --> 00:54:39,103
- While I was
staying at Andalusia,
926
00:54:39,103 --> 00:54:42,589
the farm in Georgia,
where Flannery
927
00:54:42,589 --> 00:54:45,212
lived with her mother
and needed her mother.
928
00:54:45,212 --> 00:54:47,456
Her mother, you know,
took care of her.
929
00:54:47,456 --> 00:54:50,494
I of course learned a
great deal about peacocks,
930
00:54:50,494 --> 00:54:54,532
because there were a certain
40 or 50 peacocks on the farm.
931
00:54:56,914 --> 00:54:58,640
I had a camera, and I said,
932
00:54:58,640 --> 00:55:01,263
whenever they saw my camera
they'd start to pose.
933
00:55:01,263 --> 00:55:05,198
They're real, they're
movie stars, you know.
934
00:55:05,198 --> 00:55:08,822
And she said, "I know they're
stupid and all," she said,
935
00:55:08,822 --> 00:55:11,204
"but they have a
lot to be proud of."
936
00:55:19,005 --> 00:55:21,559
- O'Connor is very
difficult to predict
937
00:55:21,559 --> 00:55:23,285
what her reactions
are going to be.
938
00:55:23,285 --> 00:55:28,255
She always had a kind of funny
bone about popular culture.
939
00:55:29,774 --> 00:55:32,708
- Her aunt finally said,
"Oh, well, you know,
940
00:55:32,708 --> 00:55:36,229
you're on television, you
know, you're important."
941
00:55:38,576 --> 00:55:39,991
- [Brad Gooch] She
gets a TV late.
942
00:55:39,991 --> 00:55:43,685
She's on TV before
she actually owns one,
943
00:55:43,685 --> 00:55:45,756
so when her work
is adapted for TV,
944
00:55:45,756 --> 00:55:48,206
she just focuses on,
well, I bought my mother
945
00:55:48,206 --> 00:55:50,657
a new refrigerator
with the royalties.
946
00:55:53,419 --> 00:55:55,110
- [Narrator] "I have just
learned via one of those
947
00:55:55,110 --> 00:55:59,114
gossip columns that the
story I sold for a TV play
948
00:55:59,114 --> 00:56:00,771
is going to be put
on in the spring,
949
00:56:00,771 --> 00:56:04,671
and that a tap dancer by
the name of Gene Kelly
950
00:56:04,671 --> 00:56:07,467
is going to make is
television debut in it.
951
00:56:09,504 --> 00:56:12,610
The punishment always
fits the crime."
952
00:56:18,892 --> 00:56:22,931
- Neither Flannery nor
Regina ever expected
953
00:56:24,035 --> 00:56:28,108
to have to live
together as adult women.
954
00:56:29,040 --> 00:56:31,146
Such a complicated relationship.
955
00:56:34,114 --> 00:56:36,772
- She was considered
an eccentric,
956
00:56:38,843 --> 00:56:41,398
and yet, she was Miss
Regina's daughter
957
00:56:41,398 --> 00:56:43,745
and her manners were
perfect, and they couldn't
958
00:56:43,745 --> 00:56:46,920
quite reconcile
these two figures.
959
00:56:46,920 --> 00:56:51,442
- Mrs. O'Connor said to me,
"Mister Giroux, can you,
960
00:56:51,442 --> 00:56:56,413
why can't you get Flannery
to write about nice people?"
961
00:56:57,862 --> 00:56:59,450
And I started to laugh,
then I looked at Flannery,
962
00:56:59,450 --> 00:57:01,314
absolutely poker faced.
963
00:57:01,314 --> 00:57:03,040
So I didn't laugh.
964
00:57:03,040 --> 00:57:05,491
Her mother really
was disappointed
965
00:57:05,491 --> 00:57:07,354
that her daughter was
not a southern belle.
966
00:57:07,354 --> 00:57:08,873
Instead, she was a writer.
967
00:57:11,600 --> 00:57:14,603
- She had to, you know, face
Regina at the dinner table,
968
00:57:14,603 --> 00:57:16,018
who was still waiting
for her to come out
969
00:57:16,018 --> 00:57:17,503
with "Gone With the Wind Two."
970
00:57:18,918 --> 00:57:20,644
- From what I understand,
she couldn't stand
971
00:57:20,644 --> 00:57:21,990
that movie when she was 14.
972
00:57:23,163 --> 00:57:25,234
- Her mother was such a classic,
973
00:57:25,234 --> 00:57:28,928
closed-mind southerner
of that era.
974
00:57:28,928 --> 00:57:33,484
I feel, though, that Flannery
had a great subject there.
975
00:57:33,484 --> 00:57:37,108
And that she did a
lot of examination
976
00:57:37,108 --> 00:57:38,972
of that particular personality.
977
00:57:38,972 --> 00:57:42,493
[typewriter keys clicking]
978
00:57:43,943 --> 00:57:46,635
- For years, I've been
fooling the sorry people.
979
00:57:46,635 --> 00:57:49,051
Sorry people, poor
white trash and niggers.
980
00:57:49,051 --> 00:57:50,915
They drain me dry.
981
00:57:50,915 --> 00:57:53,228
- I first discovered
Flannery O'Connor's work
982
00:57:53,228 --> 00:57:56,024
after I saw the
television adaptation
983
00:57:56,024 --> 00:57:58,129
of "The Displaced Person."
984
00:57:58,129 --> 00:58:00,097
- [Brad Gooch] "The
Displaced Person" is about
985
00:58:00,097 --> 00:58:02,133
an immigrant family from Poland,
986
00:58:02,133 --> 00:58:04,653
postwar refugees, who
move into the south.
987
00:58:07,207 --> 00:58:08,277
- Who are they, now?
988
00:58:08,277 --> 00:58:10,694
- They come from over the water.
989
00:58:10,694 --> 00:58:13,455
Only one of them seems
like can speak English.
990
00:58:13,455 --> 00:58:16,216
They're what is called
displaced persons.
991
00:58:16,216 --> 00:58:20,531
- Regina never dreamed that she
992
00:58:20,531 --> 00:58:22,913
was a character in
all of the stories.
993
00:58:22,913 --> 00:58:25,778
The stupid woman was herself.
994
00:58:26,986 --> 00:58:28,850
- Slowly but surely,
the father figure
995
00:58:28,850 --> 00:58:30,230
for this refugee
family starts to
996
00:58:30,230 --> 00:58:31,853
kind of take over the farm.
997
00:58:33,786 --> 00:58:34,614
- Screw?
998
00:58:38,894 --> 00:58:40,551
- The violence in the stories
999
00:58:40,551 --> 00:58:42,519
was something that
was always clear to me
1000
00:58:42,519 --> 00:58:46,453
as a symbolic act leading
to transformations.
1001
00:58:49,387 --> 00:58:52,218
[engine rumbles]
1002
00:58:59,605 --> 00:59:03,229
- Even though she is
recognizable in Mrs. McIntyre,
1003
00:59:03,229 --> 00:59:06,543
Regina was not contained
in those characters.
1004
00:59:07,820 --> 00:59:10,857
[people crying]
[priest speaking Latin]
1005
00:59:10,857 --> 00:59:13,480
- You want some kind
of clear resolution
1006
00:59:13,480 --> 00:59:16,587
of all these different
conflicts, and she
denies it to us.
1007
00:59:18,555 --> 00:59:21,143
- [Narrator] "I'm always
irritated by people who imply
1008
00:59:21,143 --> 00:59:24,768
that writing fiction is
an escape from reality.
1009
00:59:24,768 --> 00:59:27,667
It is a plunge into reality,
1010
00:59:27,667 --> 00:59:30,843
and it's very shocking
to the system."
1011
00:59:33,604 --> 00:59:35,192
- But she's funny.
1012
00:59:35,192 --> 00:59:37,401
She's really funny,
and she's often funny
1013
00:59:37,401 --> 00:59:39,023
in a very dire way.
1014
00:59:40,231 --> 00:59:42,337
The laughter is the
laughter of the skull
1015
00:59:42,337 --> 00:59:44,753
of the memento
mori on your desk.
1016
00:59:47,618 --> 00:59:50,448
[knives thudding]
1017
01:00:02,012 --> 01:00:04,083
- I didn't realize
that Flannery O'Connor
1018
01:00:04,083 --> 01:00:08,259
lived across the way from
us for many, many years.
1019
01:00:09,433 --> 01:00:11,953
It was one of our
brothers who took milk
1020
01:00:11,953 --> 01:00:15,163
from her place to
the creamery in town.
1021
01:00:17,234 --> 01:00:21,997
When we drove into
Milledgeville, the
cows that we saw
1022
01:00:21,997 --> 01:00:25,138
on the hillside going
into town would have been
1023
01:00:25,138 --> 01:00:27,037
the cows of the O'Connors.
1024
01:00:29,315 --> 01:00:32,076
- [William Sessions]
Milledgeville had a
enclosed society.
1025
01:00:32,076 --> 01:00:33,733
It's a remarkable town.
1026
01:00:34,941 --> 01:00:37,530
It really was a
culture in itself,
1027
01:00:37,530 --> 01:00:39,152
and they lived in terms of that.
1028
01:00:41,292 --> 01:00:44,088
- Of course in '52 there
was the same racism
1029
01:00:44,088 --> 01:00:45,400
that had always been there.
1030
01:00:48,955 --> 01:00:50,232
- [William Sessions]
They lived in terms of
1031
01:00:50,232 --> 01:00:51,993
the institutions
that were there.
1032
01:00:53,580 --> 01:00:55,755
- When you said you
were from Milledgeville,
1033
01:00:55,755 --> 01:00:58,171
everyone would laugh and say,
1034
01:00:58,171 --> 01:01:00,208
"Oh, you're one of
those crazy," you know,
1035
01:01:00,208 --> 01:01:02,762
it was sort of like
Milledgeville was synonymous
1036
01:01:02,762 --> 01:01:04,695
with the state hospital.
1037
01:01:08,181 --> 01:01:09,010
- Gothic.
1038
01:01:13,014 --> 01:01:13,842
Grotesque.
1039
01:01:16,500 --> 01:01:18,226
This small world.
1040
01:01:20,297 --> 01:01:24,611
A world that was circumscribed
within a farmhouse.
1041
01:01:24,611 --> 01:01:28,270
A farm, the surrounding
countryside.
1042
01:01:31,688 --> 01:01:34,829
So much could happen
in that world.
1043
01:01:41,663 --> 01:01:44,528
- [Host] Do you have a
fixed pattern of work?
1044
01:01:44,528 --> 01:01:46,150
- Yes, I work every morning.
1045
01:01:46,150 --> 01:01:47,462
- [Host] And you
don't miss a day?
1046
01:01:47,462 --> 01:01:49,153
- No. Not even Sunday.
1047
01:01:49,153 --> 01:01:50,707
- Intense.
1048
01:01:50,707 --> 01:01:54,296
I remember that Tomas Mann once
said that he hated writing,
1049
01:01:54,296 --> 01:01:57,403
that it was a trap that
he had fallen into.
1050
01:01:57,403 --> 01:01:58,611
Do you feel that at all?
1051
01:01:59,854 --> 01:02:02,063
- Well, I think you hate
it and you love it, too.
1052
01:02:03,340 --> 01:02:05,791
Something that, when you
can't do anything else,
1053
01:02:05,791 --> 01:02:07,344
you have to do that.
1054
01:02:09,277 --> 01:02:13,453
- The ear for Flannery
O'Connor is everything.
1055
01:02:13,453 --> 01:02:15,593
Not the eye. The ear.
1056
01:02:16,733 --> 01:02:21,530
- She liked capturing
the actual speech
1057
01:02:21,530 --> 01:02:23,049
of all these people around her.
1058
01:02:23,049 --> 01:02:27,433
The actual speech of many
southern whites at that time
1059
01:02:27,433 --> 01:02:30,401
was racist, and she
would record it.
1060
01:02:31,575 --> 01:02:34,509
- We have a good
set of niggers here.
1061
01:02:34,509 --> 01:02:37,098
And they don't want
to be disturbed.
1062
01:02:37,098 --> 01:02:38,962
I have one that I just love.
1063
01:02:38,962 --> 01:02:41,481
She nursed my children
for about six years.
1064
01:02:42,655 --> 01:02:45,071
Of course, there are
some getting some ideas,
1065
01:02:46,141 --> 01:02:47,522
and that's all right.
1066
01:02:47,522 --> 01:02:48,626
That's progress.
1067
01:02:54,322 --> 01:02:57,704
- Part of my worry as a
reader is that she's too good,
1068
01:02:58,740 --> 01:03:01,432
by which I mean that her mimicry
1069
01:03:01,432 --> 01:03:03,952
of the voices around
her is too acute.
1070
01:03:06,575 --> 01:03:09,302
In that accuracy,
she doomed herself,
1071
01:03:09,302 --> 01:03:11,235
because a lot of these
stories are judged
1072
01:03:11,235 --> 01:03:13,893
by modern readers
as unacceptable.
1073
01:03:16,585 --> 01:03:18,587
- I don't associate with
niggers, but on the other hand
1074
01:03:18,587 --> 01:03:20,382
I don't associate with
common white trash
1075
01:03:20,382 --> 01:03:22,281
or Jews or Catholics,
if I can help it.
1076
01:03:25,732 --> 01:03:28,632
- She's a brilliant
reporter about the ways
1077
01:03:28,632 --> 01:03:31,290
in which the social
order was changing.
1078
01:03:31,290 --> 01:03:33,395
Over and over again in her
stories, she was showing
1079
01:03:33,395 --> 01:03:37,192
the disruption of the
fantasy of whiteness.
1080
01:03:37,192 --> 01:03:38,538
The fantasy of power.
1081
01:03:40,092 --> 01:03:42,819
- I think Flannery
was writing for people
1082
01:03:42,819 --> 01:03:44,717
who have been racist
for a long time,
1083
01:03:44,717 --> 01:03:48,479
and they know there's
something wrong with that.
1084
01:03:51,172 --> 01:03:54,520
- [Hilton Als] I don't
think Flannery was racist
1085
01:03:54,520 --> 01:03:56,487
so much as she has a knee
jerk reaction to race
1086
01:03:56,487 --> 01:03:59,421
in the way that
she had a knee-jerk
reaction to her mother.
1087
01:03:59,421 --> 01:04:01,285
- I expect that before
long, there won't be
1088
01:04:01,285 --> 01:04:04,288
no more niggers on the place,
and I'll tell you what,
1089
01:04:04,288 --> 01:04:06,152
I'd rather have niggers
than them Poles.
1090
01:04:07,533 --> 01:04:10,018
- [Sally Fitzgerald] "Artificial
Nigger" was a reference
1091
01:04:10,018 --> 01:04:11,606
to a little hitching post.
1092
01:04:11,606 --> 01:04:13,642
They were ornaments.
1093
01:04:13,642 --> 01:04:17,163
She heard the expression
from a local country man,
1094
01:04:17,163 --> 01:04:19,925
and she knew at once that
she must use it somewhere.
1095
01:04:19,925 --> 01:04:24,343
[typewriter keys clicking]
1096
01:04:24,343 --> 01:04:27,725
- [Narrator] "The Artificial
Nigger" tells the story
1097
01:04:27,725 --> 01:04:30,142
of the elderly Mister
Head who brings
1098
01:04:30,142 --> 01:04:33,317
his young grandson
Nelson to Atlanta
1099
01:04:33,317 --> 01:04:35,975
to see negros for
the first time.
1100
01:04:37,977 --> 01:04:39,461
[train whistle blows]
1101
01:04:39,461 --> 01:04:43,155
"'That was a Nigger,' Mister
Head said and sat back.
1102
01:04:43,155 --> 01:04:46,365
Nelson jumped up on the seat
and stood looking backward
1103
01:04:46,365 --> 01:04:49,816
to the end of the car,
but the negro had gone.
1104
01:04:49,816 --> 01:04:51,370
'I'd have thought
you'd know a nigger,
1105
01:04:51,370 --> 01:04:53,579
since you've seen
so many when you was
1106
01:04:53,579 --> 01:04:56,202
in the city on
your first visit.'
1107
01:04:56,202 --> 01:04:57,928
'That's his first
nigger,' he said
1108
01:04:57,928 --> 01:05:00,172
to the man across the aisle.
1109
01:05:00,172 --> 01:05:05,039
The boy slid down into the
seat. 'You said they were black.
1110
01:05:05,039 --> 01:05:07,351
You never said they were tan.
1111
01:05:07,351 --> 01:05:09,560
How do you expect
me to know anything
1112
01:05:09,560 --> 01:05:11,459
when you don't tell me right?'"
1113
01:05:12,909 --> 01:05:14,807
- Suddenly the boy is wondering,
1114
01:05:14,807 --> 01:05:17,672
what language have
you been using?
1115
01:05:17,672 --> 01:05:20,295
You know, because negro or black
1116
01:05:20,295 --> 01:05:21,848
doesn't describe what this is.
1117
01:05:21,848 --> 01:05:25,024
- You take those white
racist characters,
1118
01:05:25,024 --> 01:05:26,784
one of whom is
learning to be a racist
1119
01:05:26,784 --> 01:05:28,855
in the course of the story.
1120
01:05:28,855 --> 01:05:31,582
You take them to Atlanta,
and they encounter
1121
01:05:31,582 --> 01:05:34,758
scene after scene after scene
after scene after scene,
1122
01:05:34,758 --> 01:05:36,794
where they have to
be learning that
1123
01:05:36,794 --> 01:05:40,350
their racism has hurt them.
1124
01:05:43,387 --> 01:05:47,978
- [Brad Gooch] She insisted
on having this title,
1125
01:05:47,978 --> 01:05:52,810
so there's a way in which
she was true to what
1126
01:05:52,810 --> 01:05:55,779
she was actually observing
and hearing around her.
1127
01:05:55,779 --> 01:05:58,506
And she could put
on blinders about
1128
01:05:58,506 --> 01:06:01,336
what the repercussions might be.
1129
01:06:01,336 --> 01:06:03,994
- [Flannery] Well, but
the title was so dominant.
1130
01:06:06,479 --> 01:06:09,172
- [Man] It's hard
to live up to it.
1131
01:06:09,172 --> 01:06:12,589
- [Flannery] I didn't want to
hurt anybody's feelings.
1132
01:06:12,589 --> 01:06:14,591
I stood out for my title.
1133
01:06:17,007 --> 01:06:19,906
- She's been banned,
'cause the N-word came out.
1134
01:06:19,906 --> 01:06:21,632
And that's true in
certain universities
1135
01:06:21,632 --> 01:06:24,946
that her text
won't be read because
1136
01:06:24,946 --> 01:06:27,121
the N-word is used
or something else.
1137
01:06:27,121 --> 01:06:28,812
And this seems to
me unfortunate,
1138
01:06:28,812 --> 01:06:30,779
It's like Huckleberry Finn.
1139
01:06:30,779 --> 01:06:34,093
- I think "The Artificial
Nigger" is an amazing story
1140
01:06:34,093 --> 01:06:37,959
in terms of behavior
and the ways in which
1141
01:06:37,959 --> 01:06:42,860
this sort of almost Pilgrim's
Progress through Atlanta
1142
01:06:42,860 --> 01:06:47,831
and through difference,
transforms these people.
1143
01:06:49,177 --> 01:06:50,730
- Well I think there
Flannery's telling the truth
1144
01:06:50,730 --> 01:06:54,251
that recovering from white
racism takes a long time.
1145
01:06:55,321 --> 01:07:00,292
♪ On a hill far away
1146
01:07:02,432 --> 01:07:07,333
♪ Stood an old rugged cross
1147
01:07:09,542 --> 01:07:13,753
♪ The emblem of
suffrin' and shame ♪
1148
01:07:19,725 --> 01:07:22,383
[geese honking]
1149
01:07:23,901 --> 01:07:27,767
- [Richard Rodriguez] Around
1954 she met Eric Langkjaer-
1150
01:07:27,767 --> 01:07:30,046
- Who had grown up in Denmark,
1151
01:07:30,046 --> 01:07:32,565
decided to come to this country.
1152
01:07:32,565 --> 01:07:34,912
He was very much interested
in religious matters,
1153
01:07:34,912 --> 01:07:36,880
but he was far from
being a Catholic.
1154
01:07:38,571 --> 01:07:41,402
- I was working
for Harcourt Brace
1155
01:07:41,402 --> 01:07:44,405
as a college textbook salesman.
1156
01:07:44,405 --> 01:07:47,166
And I had the
whole of the south,
1157
01:07:47,166 --> 01:07:50,307
east of the Mississippi
as my territory.
1158
01:07:51,791 --> 01:07:53,862
- [Sally Fitzgerald] And one
of his stops along the way
1159
01:07:53,862 --> 01:07:56,865
was Georgia College
in Milledgeville.
1160
01:07:56,865 --> 01:07:59,661
And when he was there,
on his first visit,
1161
01:07:59,661 --> 01:08:01,698
he went out to meet Flannery.
1162
01:08:01,698 --> 01:08:03,596
They became fast friends.
1163
01:08:05,598 --> 01:08:06,875
- [Richard Rodriguez]
Eric Langkjaer,
1164
01:08:06,875 --> 01:08:11,501
tall, very learned and
interesting young man,
1165
01:08:12,985 --> 01:08:16,851
develops this fascination
from his side with O'Connor.
1166
01:08:18,749 --> 01:08:20,579
She was very isolated.
1167
01:08:20,579 --> 01:08:24,307
This chance to have these
kinds of conversations
1168
01:08:24,307 --> 01:08:27,793
with a handsome young man
were very important to her.
1169
01:08:28,966 --> 01:08:31,210
- He liked her very much
and they had clearly
1170
01:08:31,210 --> 01:08:34,110
a kind of affinity and he
perceived that her life
1171
01:08:34,110 --> 01:08:37,906
was very limited and so he
would take her out for rides.
1172
01:08:39,184 --> 01:08:41,841
- [Richard Rodriguez]
This relationship
1173
01:08:41,841 --> 01:08:45,155
has a romantic aspect to it.
1174
01:08:45,155 --> 01:08:47,882
One of the women who
worked on the farm
1175
01:08:47,882 --> 01:08:50,367
said to someone else
who worked there,
1176
01:08:50,367 --> 01:08:53,025
"That's her boyfriend.
They're going out on a date."
1177
01:08:55,165 --> 01:08:58,237
- I had to completely
rearrange my itinerary
1178
01:08:59,411 --> 01:09:01,723
so as to be able to
end up in Milledgeville
1179
01:09:01,723 --> 01:09:04,657
as often as possible
on weekends.
1180
01:09:04,657 --> 01:09:08,972
And I would say that
Regina absolutely did not
1181
01:09:08,972 --> 01:09:10,663
discourage this sort of thing.
1182
01:09:12,424 --> 01:09:13,666
- [Richard Rodriguez]
On his last time
1183
01:09:13,666 --> 01:09:17,291
before he's going off to
Europe for the summer,
1184
01:09:17,291 --> 01:09:20,086
they go for a ride in his car.
1185
01:09:21,571 --> 01:09:24,160
- I may not have been
in love, but I was
1186
01:09:24,160 --> 01:09:26,990
very much aware that
she was a woman.
1187
01:09:28,440 --> 01:09:33,030
So I felt that I'd like
to kiss her, which I did.
1188
01:09:37,414 --> 01:09:42,385
I was not by any means a Don
Juan, but in my late twenties,
1189
01:09:43,558 --> 01:09:46,112
I had of course
kissed other girls.
1190
01:09:46,112 --> 01:09:50,600
And there had been
this firm response
1191
01:09:51,808 --> 01:09:53,706
which was totally
lacking in Flannery.
1192
01:09:54,949 --> 01:09:57,607
I had a feeling of
kissing a skeleton
1193
01:09:58,849 --> 01:10:03,026
and it reminded me of
her being gravely ill.
1194
01:10:04,165 --> 01:10:06,581
- [Mary Gordon] He loved
her, he revered her
1195
01:10:06,581 --> 01:10:09,239
particularly as a writer,
but he was very freaked out.
1196
01:10:10,689 --> 01:10:13,278
He then left the country,
went back to Denmark.
1197
01:10:13,278 --> 01:10:15,935
- Then ensued a number
of letters from Flannery,
1198
01:10:15,935 --> 01:10:18,938
about 13, which
are very revealing.
1199
01:10:19,836 --> 01:10:21,596
- [Narrator] "Dear, dear Eric,
1200
01:10:21,596 --> 01:10:24,703
you're wonderful
and wildly original.
1201
01:10:24,703 --> 01:10:27,637
Did I tell you I call
my baby pea chicken
1202
01:10:27,637 --> 01:10:31,779
Brother in public
and Eric in private?"
1203
01:10:31,779 --> 01:10:35,196
- In the course of time, he
wrote announcing his engagement.
1204
01:10:36,508 --> 01:10:38,820
Flannery felt this
disappointment very deeply.
1205
01:10:40,201 --> 01:10:43,480
Her mother had never mentioned
Eric Langkjaer to me.
1206
01:10:43,480 --> 01:10:46,483
We were old friends and I was
able to push her a little bit
1207
01:10:46,483 --> 01:10:50,280
and I said, "But did
she suffer, Regina?
1208
01:10:50,280 --> 01:10:52,386
Did she suffer over this?"
1209
01:10:52,386 --> 01:10:55,043
And she looked down and against
1210
01:10:55,043 --> 01:10:58,771
her customary reserve,
she was able to say,
1211
01:10:58,771 --> 01:11:01,602
"Yes she did. It was terrible."
1212
01:11:06,538 --> 01:11:08,643
- [Richard Rodriguez] She
has a terrible emotional
1213
01:11:08,643 --> 01:11:11,163
personal reaction, but
also a literary reaction
1214
01:11:11,163 --> 01:11:14,200
which is in four days,
which is almost record time
1215
01:11:14,200 --> 01:11:17,514
for O'Connor, who was known
as the demon rewriter,
1216
01:11:17,514 --> 01:11:21,760
she writes "Good
Country People," a
story that in some way
1217
01:11:21,760 --> 01:11:25,902
metaphorically is about
this relationship.
1218
01:11:25,902 --> 01:11:28,284
- [Mary Gordon] "Good
Country People" is this story
1219
01:11:28,284 --> 01:11:30,700
of an unhappy woman
with a wooden leg
1220
01:11:30,700 --> 01:11:32,391
from a hunting accident.
1221
01:11:32,391 --> 01:11:36,395
Her given name was Joy, but
she changed it to Hulga,
1222
01:11:36,395 --> 01:11:38,017
just to spite her mother.
1223
01:11:38,017 --> 01:11:41,711
One day, a traveling Bible
salesman comes to her door.
1224
01:11:41,711 --> 01:11:46,440
- Eric's lists from Harcourt
Brace, he called the Bible.
1225
01:11:46,440 --> 01:11:48,959
- Reading it, I
realized right away
1226
01:11:48,959 --> 01:11:52,860
that here I was in
some sort of disguise.
1227
01:11:55,207 --> 01:11:56,691
- [Richard Rodriguez] In
the hayloft on the farm
1228
01:11:56,691 --> 01:12:01,317
that's exactly a replica of
Andalusia, the O'Connor's farm,
1229
01:12:01,317 --> 01:12:04,423
she has this kind of flirtation
with the Bible salesmen.
1230
01:12:05,562 --> 01:12:08,116
He gets her to unscrew
her wooden leg,
1231
01:12:08,116 --> 01:12:09,601
and then makes off with it.
1232
01:12:11,188 --> 01:12:13,294
- "'Give me my leg,'
she screamed and
tried to lunge for it,
1233
01:12:13,294 --> 01:12:14,985
but he pushed her down easily.
1234
01:12:16,470 --> 01:12:18,851
'What's the matter with you
all of the sudden,' he asked,
1235
01:12:18,851 --> 01:12:21,509
frowning as he screwed
the top on the flask
1236
01:12:21,509 --> 01:12:24,132
and put it quickly
back inside the Bible.
1237
01:12:24,132 --> 01:12:27,412
'You just awhile ago said you
didn't believe in nothing.
1238
01:12:27,412 --> 01:12:30,069
I thought you was some girl.'
1239
01:12:30,069 --> 01:12:32,417
'Give me my leg,' she screeched.
1240
01:12:32,417 --> 01:12:35,074
He jumped up so quickly
that she barely saw him
1241
01:12:35,074 --> 01:12:38,595
sweep the cards and the
blue box into the Bible
1242
01:12:38,595 --> 01:12:40,701
and throw the Bible
into the valise.
1243
01:12:42,150 --> 01:12:46,189
And then the toast colored
hat disappeared down the hole
1244
01:12:46,189 --> 01:12:48,950
and the girl was left
sitting on the straw
1245
01:12:48,950 --> 01:12:51,367
in the dusty sunlight.
1246
01:12:51,367 --> 01:12:55,543
When she turned her churning
face toward the opening,
1247
01:12:55,543 --> 01:12:59,375
she saw his blue figure
struggling successfully
1248
01:12:59,375 --> 01:13:01,722
over the green speckled lake."
1249
01:13:04,794 --> 01:13:06,416
you know, as Dostoevsky said,
1250
01:13:06,416 --> 01:13:08,763
"Without God, everything
is permitted."
1251
01:13:15,252 --> 01:13:18,117
- [Narrator] "Dear Eric, I'm
highly taken with the thought
1252
01:13:18,117 --> 01:13:21,086
of you seeing yourself
as the Bible salesman.
1253
01:13:21,086 --> 01:13:25,539
Dear boy, remove this delusion
from your head at once.
1254
01:13:25,539 --> 01:13:28,024
Never let it be said that
I don't make the most
1255
01:13:28,024 --> 01:13:32,304
of experience and information,
no matter how meager."
1256
01:13:33,926 --> 01:13:38,206
♪ Well just because you
think you're so pretty ♪
1257
01:13:38,206 --> 01:13:41,831
♪ Just because you
think you're so hot ♪
1258
01:13:41,831 --> 01:13:45,386
♪ Just because you think
you got something ♪
1259
01:13:45,386 --> 01:13:49,183
♪ That nobody else has got
1260
01:13:49,183 --> 01:13:52,773
♪ So you make me
spend all my money ♪
1261
01:13:52,773 --> 01:13:56,604
♪ You laugh and call
me Old Santa Claus ♪
1262
01:13:56,604 --> 01:13:58,123
♪ But I'm telling you
1263
01:13:58,123 --> 01:14:00,194
♪ Honey, I'm through with you
1264
01:14:00,194 --> 01:14:04,647
♪ Honey, 'cause, just because
1265
01:14:04,647 --> 01:14:07,339
[pen scratching]
1266
01:14:09,583 --> 01:14:13,587
- I for myself think that
although Ms. O'Connor
1267
01:14:13,587 --> 01:14:16,348
can be called a Southern writer,
1268
01:14:16,348 --> 01:14:18,005
I agree that she's
not a Southern writer,
1269
01:14:18,005 --> 01:14:22,941
just as Faulkner isn't,
and that they are,
1270
01:14:24,114 --> 01:14:26,703
for want of a better
term, universal writers.
1271
01:14:26,703 --> 01:14:28,222
They're writing
about all mankind
1272
01:14:28,222 --> 01:14:31,950
and about relationships and
the mystery of relationships.
1273
01:14:31,950 --> 01:14:34,953
And I'm relieved that you
write as simply as you do.
1274
01:14:34,953 --> 01:14:37,611
- So after the disruption
of a relationship with Eric
1275
01:14:37,611 --> 01:14:39,095
and also then the publication of
1276
01:14:39,095 --> 01:14:42,098
"A Good Man is Hard
to Find," she develops
1277
01:14:42,098 --> 01:14:43,858
different sorts
of relationships.
1278
01:14:43,858 --> 01:14:46,378
That kind of friendship
with Maryat Lee,
1279
01:14:46,378 --> 01:14:48,414
bisexual sister of
the President of
1280
01:14:48,414 --> 01:14:51,348
the Georgia State College
for Women comes to see her.
1281
01:14:51,348 --> 01:14:54,490
And Maryat Lee is living
in Greenwich Village
1282
01:14:54,490 --> 01:14:58,286
and the unlikely
eccentric looking woman
1283
01:14:58,286 --> 01:15:00,841
in the middle of Georgia,
walking around in boots
1284
01:15:00,841 --> 01:15:02,325
and a cape and things like that.
1285
01:15:02,325 --> 01:15:05,190
But again, the two hit it off.
1286
01:15:05,190 --> 01:15:08,296
- Maryat and I came out once
and Flannery was painting.
1287
01:15:08,296 --> 01:15:10,367
And I think she was
working on this piece.
1288
01:15:17,651 --> 01:15:21,517
- She shows first of all
her tremendous generosity
1289
01:15:21,517 --> 01:15:26,487
as a friend and her
gameful spirit, you know,
1290
01:15:27,868 --> 01:15:29,283
especially with Maryat
Lee, just hilarious spirit.
1291
01:15:31,872 --> 01:15:36,393
- Maryat's very being kind
of buttressed Flannery's,
1292
01:15:36,393 --> 01:15:38,637
okay, there's another
one out there.
1293
01:15:41,329 --> 01:15:46,300
- She could scowl as effectively
as anybody I've ever known.
1294
01:15:49,234 --> 01:15:52,893
One of the few signs
of Flannery's lupus
1295
01:15:52,893 --> 01:15:56,586
was the fact that
after the midday meal,
1296
01:15:57,725 --> 01:16:00,417
you could see her tiring.
1297
01:16:00,417 --> 01:16:03,420
The cortisone derivative
that she took,
1298
01:16:03,420 --> 01:16:05,975
which saved her life,
had softened the bones
1299
01:16:05,975 --> 01:16:08,494
and also had put her on crutches
1300
01:16:08,494 --> 01:16:10,289
and this had altered
her appearance.
1301
01:16:11,774 --> 01:16:14,570
But she was wonderfully animated
1302
01:16:14,570 --> 01:16:16,779
when she was interested
in what she was saying,
1303
01:16:16,779 --> 01:16:20,196
when a good question was asked
1304
01:16:20,196 --> 01:16:24,476
and she could answer with zest.
1305
01:16:25,857 --> 01:16:27,893
- [Narrator] "If the
fact that I'm a celebrity
1306
01:16:27,893 --> 01:16:30,275
makes you feel
silly, what dear girl
1307
01:16:30,275 --> 01:16:32,277
do you think it makes me feel?
1308
01:16:32,277 --> 01:16:36,246
It's a comic distinction
shared with Roy Rogers' horse
1309
01:16:36,246 --> 01:16:39,249
and Miss Watermelon of 1955."
1310
01:16:41,286 --> 01:16:44,979
- Betty Hester appeared at
a point in Flannery's life
1311
01:16:44,979 --> 01:16:47,879
where she had just had
a bit of disappointment
1312
01:16:47,879 --> 01:16:50,640
and realized that she
was going to be alone
1313
01:16:50,640 --> 01:16:52,021
for the rest of her
life, that her life
1314
01:16:52,021 --> 01:16:53,919
was going to be writing.
1315
01:16:53,919 --> 01:16:55,680
And she needed conversation.
1316
01:16:56,888 --> 01:16:59,511
And suddenly she
received a letter
1317
01:16:59,511 --> 01:17:02,376
from a complete
stranger in Atlanta
1318
01:17:02,376 --> 01:17:04,965
who seemed to realize
that these stories,
1319
01:17:04,965 --> 01:17:07,070
as she put it, are about God.
1320
01:17:08,485 --> 01:17:12,006
And Flannery said, "Who is
this who understands my story?"
1321
01:17:14,146 --> 01:17:17,184
- [Narrator] "I'm very
pleased to have your letter.
1322
01:17:17,184 --> 01:17:19,773
Perhaps it is even more
startling to me to find
1323
01:17:19,773 --> 01:17:23,190
someone who recognizes
my work for what I try
1324
01:17:23,190 --> 01:17:26,193
to make it than it
is for you to find
1325
01:17:26,193 --> 01:17:29,368
a God-conscious
writer near at hand.
1326
01:17:29,368 --> 01:17:32,855
The distance is 87
miles, but I feel
1327
01:17:32,855 --> 01:17:35,789
the spiritual distance
is much shorter."
1328
01:17:39,206 --> 01:17:40,759
- There began a conversation
1329
01:17:40,759 --> 01:17:43,313
that lasted for
years, by letter.
1330
01:17:43,313 --> 01:17:45,074
They wrote every two weeks,
1331
01:17:45,074 --> 01:17:48,940
Betty Hester was a clerk
in a credit office.
1332
01:17:50,113 --> 01:17:52,184
- Betty was lesbian
and had actually
1333
01:17:52,184 --> 01:17:55,222
suffered horribly far that, I
mean she was in the Air Force
1334
01:17:55,222 --> 01:18:00,192
and she was kicked out and
had to go back to 1950 South
1335
01:18:00,192 --> 01:18:03,644
where it was hard for a
woman, period, to get a job.
1336
01:18:03,644 --> 01:18:06,612
And if your service
records said something,
1337
01:18:06,612 --> 01:18:08,511
you may as well go back
to the penitentiary.
1338
01:18:08,511 --> 01:18:11,238
She lived in fear
from that time on,
1339
01:18:11,238 --> 01:18:12,964
she had no relationships
with anybody.
1340
01:18:12,964 --> 01:18:14,137
She lived with her aunt.
1341
01:18:15,621 --> 01:18:19,695
- She had a dingy little job
and her whole life was reading
1342
01:18:19,695 --> 01:18:23,491
and the letters that she
elicited from Flannery are
1343
01:18:23,491 --> 01:18:26,909
among the real treasures to be
found in Flannery's letters.
1344
01:18:28,082 --> 01:18:30,429
- [Narrator] "I found
myself in a world
1345
01:18:30,429 --> 01:18:33,398
where everybody has
his compartment,
1346
01:18:33,398 --> 01:18:37,505
puts you in yours, shuts
the door, and departs.
1347
01:18:37,505 --> 01:18:41,855
My audience are the people
who think God is dead.
1348
01:18:41,855 --> 01:18:43,546
At least these are the people
1349
01:18:43,546 --> 01:18:45,721
I am conscious of writing for."
1350
01:18:46,963 --> 01:18:48,758
- Then Betty Hester,
she writes a letter
1351
01:18:48,758 --> 01:18:51,485
of almost confession
to Flannery O'Connor
1352
01:18:51,485 --> 01:18:54,246
about the lesbian activity
that had caused her
1353
01:18:54,246 --> 01:18:56,317
to be discharged
from the military.
1354
01:18:57,905 --> 01:19:00,114
When you're reading
this exchange of
letters between them,
1355
01:19:00,114 --> 01:19:02,910
I was on the edge of my seat
because you're wondering
1356
01:19:02,910 --> 01:19:05,016
where O'Connor is
going to go with this.
1357
01:19:05,016 --> 01:19:07,397
I mean she could go
almost either way.
1358
01:19:08,813 --> 01:19:11,747
- [Narrator] "Betty, I
can't write you fast enough
1359
01:19:11,747 --> 01:19:14,957
and tell you that it
doesn't make the slightest
1360
01:19:14,957 --> 01:19:18,029
bit of difference in
my opinion of you,
1361
01:19:18,029 --> 01:19:21,480
which is the same as it
was, and that is based
1362
01:19:21,480 --> 01:19:25,036
solidly on complete respect.
1363
01:19:25,036 --> 01:19:27,901
You've done me nothing but good.
1364
01:19:27,901 --> 01:19:30,317
But the fact is
above and beyond this
1365
01:19:30,317 --> 01:19:34,079
that I have a spiritual
relationship to you.
1366
01:19:34,079 --> 01:19:36,668
What is necessary
for you to know
1367
01:19:36,668 --> 01:19:41,638
is my very real love
and admiration for you.
1368
01:19:42,363 --> 01:19:43,192
Yours, Flannery."
1369
01:19:44,814 --> 01:19:49,405
- Flannery's letters were
her closest relationships
1370
01:19:50,855 --> 01:19:54,893
with other human beings and
they were very important to her
1371
01:19:56,377 --> 01:20:01,348
and she worked really hard
to be the kind of friend
1372
01:20:02,521 --> 01:20:04,972
that an individual
needed for her to be.
1373
01:20:04,972 --> 01:20:08,562
Those letters, those are
her real love relationships.
1374
01:20:10,529 --> 01:20:13,567
- A book of letters
could reveal a person
1375
01:20:13,567 --> 01:20:16,984
in a way that biography doesn't.
1376
01:20:18,158 --> 01:20:21,471
- "The Habit of Being"
opened that door
1377
01:20:21,471 --> 01:20:23,819
so that people understood
that this woman
1378
01:20:23,819 --> 01:20:28,824
had a religious point of
view, that she saw life
1379
01:20:30,032 --> 01:20:32,655
as the action of God's
grace and that without
1380
01:20:32,655 --> 01:20:35,900
understanding that,
it's impossible to know
1381
01:20:35,900 --> 01:20:39,006
what she was doing and what
those stories really mean.
1382
01:20:39,006 --> 01:20:41,422
- That's the whole point
of her writing, I think,
1383
01:20:41,422 --> 01:20:45,323
the Catholic thinking,
to not be so doctrinaire
1384
01:20:45,323 --> 01:20:47,463
that she revealed
it to be obvious
1385
01:20:47,463 --> 01:20:49,499
to feeling and thinking people.
1386
01:20:56,541 --> 01:21:01,166
♪ Wildcat Willie,
lookin' mighty pale ♪
1387
01:21:01,166 --> 01:21:03,997
♪ Was standin' by
the Sheriff's side ♪
1388
01:21:03,997 --> 01:21:05,826
♪ And when that Sheriff said
1389
01:21:05,826 --> 01:21:08,139
♪ I'm sendin' you to jail
1390
01:21:08,139 --> 01:21:10,520
♪ Wildcat raised
his head and cried ♪
1391
01:21:10,520 --> 01:21:12,937
♪ Oh give me land,
lots of land ♪
1392
01:21:12,937 --> 01:21:15,629
♪ Under starry skies above
1393
01:21:15,629 --> 01:21:18,459
♪ Don't fence me in
1394
01:21:18,459 --> 01:21:20,392
♪ Let me ride through
the wide open ♪
1395
01:21:20,392 --> 01:21:22,705
♪ Country that I love
1396
01:21:22,705 --> 01:21:25,570
♪ Don't fence me in
1397
01:21:25,570 --> 01:21:29,505
♪ Let me be by myself
in the evenin' breeze ♪
1398
01:21:29,505 --> 01:21:33,129
♪ And listen to the murmur
of the cottonwood trees ♪
1399
01:21:33,129 --> 01:21:37,133
♪ Send me off forever
but I ask you please ♪
1400
01:21:37,133 --> 01:21:38,617
♪ Don't fence me in
1401
01:21:38,617 --> 01:21:40,240
- Why do you have to fight
for your civil rights?
1402
01:21:41,655 --> 01:21:44,727
If you're fighting
for your civil rights,
1403
01:21:44,727 --> 01:21:46,867
that means you're not a citizen.
1404
01:21:46,867 --> 01:21:49,905
- There was a famous incident
that's been cited a good deal
1405
01:21:49,905 --> 01:21:52,528
when Flannery was
invited by Maryat Lee
1406
01:21:52,528 --> 01:21:55,911
to meet James Baldwin, she
offered to arrange a meeting
1407
01:21:55,911 --> 01:21:58,396
when Baldwin was
traveling through Georgia.
1408
01:21:58,396 --> 01:22:01,364
And Flannery declined
this meeting.
1409
01:22:01,364 --> 01:22:04,436
Although she was careful
to say that she would be
1410
01:22:04,436 --> 01:22:07,232
delighted to meet James
Baldwin anywhere else,
1411
01:22:07,232 --> 01:22:10,235
but she would not meet
him in Milledgeville.
1412
01:22:11,685 --> 01:22:14,343
- [Narrator] "In New York,
it would be nice to meet him.
1413
01:22:14,343 --> 01:22:16,345
Here, it would not.
1414
01:22:16,345 --> 01:22:20,004
I observe the traditions
of the society I feed on.
1415
01:22:23,283 --> 01:22:25,561
Might as well
expect a mule to fly
1416
01:22:25,561 --> 01:22:29,151
as me to see James
Baldwin in Georgia."
1417
01:22:29,151 --> 01:22:31,532
- She didn't want to be a
spokesman for the South.
1418
01:22:31,532 --> 01:22:33,603
She was an artist.
1419
01:22:33,603 --> 01:22:35,674
She could only talk
about the South
1420
01:22:36,641 --> 01:22:39,092
if she was one of its citizens.
1421
01:22:39,092 --> 01:22:42,958
If they met in Georgia, it
would be a civil rights cause
1422
01:22:42,958 --> 01:22:46,892
and she would not be able to
live in that town unobserved.
1423
01:22:46,892 --> 01:22:49,033
And that was the whole
point of writing for her
1424
01:22:49,033 --> 01:22:52,105
was to be almost a reporter.
1425
01:22:55,729 --> 01:22:57,144
- [William Sessions]
Flannery was crippled,
1426
01:22:57,144 --> 01:22:58,456
Flannery was sick.
1427
01:22:58,456 --> 01:23:00,044
She couldn't say, "I'm
out of here, I'm out."
1428
01:23:00,044 --> 01:23:01,424
"Where are you going Flannery?
1429
01:23:01,424 --> 01:23:03,254
Where are you going
to get the money?"
1430
01:23:03,254 --> 01:23:04,772
They had no money.
1431
01:23:04,772 --> 01:23:07,396
I mean Flannery didn't make
any money from her books.
1432
01:23:07,396 --> 01:23:09,846
That's why she went
out on speaking tours.
1433
01:23:09,846 --> 01:23:13,333
- [Narrator] "Next week I go
to Rosary College in Chicago
1434
01:23:13,333 --> 01:23:15,093
and then to Notre Dame.
1435
01:23:15,093 --> 01:23:17,751
Then I have to go
to Emory and talk to
1436
01:23:17,751 --> 01:23:21,997
a Methodist Juden
congregation on the South,
1437
01:23:21,997 --> 01:23:23,929
their choice of topic.
1438
01:23:23,929 --> 01:23:27,726
A little of this 'honored
guest' business goes a long way,
1439
01:23:27,726 --> 01:23:30,557
but it sure does
help my finances."
1440
01:23:30,557 --> 01:23:32,145
- [Sally Fitzgerald]
For these meetings,
1441
01:23:32,145 --> 01:23:34,630
she wrote these
wonderful little essays
1442
01:23:34,630 --> 01:23:36,425
that appear in
"Mystery and Manners."
1443
01:23:37,771 --> 01:23:40,946
- [Flannery] There is
something in us as storytellers
1444
01:23:40,946 --> 01:23:44,122
and as listeners to
stories, that demands
1445
01:23:44,122 --> 01:23:48,230
a redemptive act, that
demands that what falls
1446
01:23:48,230 --> 01:23:50,991
at least be offered the
chance of restoration.
1447
01:23:52,441 --> 01:23:55,582
[protestors shouting]
1448
01:24:01,036 --> 01:24:04,694
- [Brad Gooch] When she came
in to live in the South,
1449
01:24:04,694 --> 01:24:09,113
she felt that Northerners
were trying to either
1450
01:24:09,113 --> 01:24:13,393
have some moral superiority
in their positions on race
1451
01:24:13,393 --> 01:24:16,051
or were trying to
impose changes.
1452
01:24:17,673 --> 01:24:21,953
So she had a position you
couldn't easily characterize.
1453
01:24:24,162 --> 01:24:26,164
- [Narrator] "I am
speculating that maybe,
1454
01:24:26,164 --> 01:24:29,650
by the time of your next
visit, some of the local
1455
01:24:29,650 --> 01:24:33,827
backwoodsmen will be irritated
enough by things in general
1456
01:24:33,827 --> 01:24:37,382
to stage a little cross
burning on the mansion lawn.
1457
01:24:37,382 --> 01:24:39,936
Last time the Klan had
a big gathering here,
1458
01:24:39,936 --> 01:24:42,629
they set up a
portable fiery cross
1459
01:24:42,629 --> 01:24:43,975
in front of the courthouse.
1460
01:24:43,975 --> 01:24:47,047
That is to say
they plugged it in.
1461
01:24:47,047 --> 01:24:50,947
It was lit from many
red electric bulbs."
1462
01:24:52,328 --> 01:24:55,538
- Maryat Lee poked fun
at Flannery's religion
1463
01:24:55,538 --> 01:24:59,853
and Flannery poked fun
at Maryat's activism.
1464
01:24:59,853 --> 01:25:01,751
Flannery addressed
her friend Maryat
1465
01:25:01,751 --> 01:25:05,686
as "Dear nigger-loving
New York white woman."
1466
01:25:05,686 --> 01:25:09,449
It was the New York white woman
that was the hidden insult,
1467
01:25:09,449 --> 01:25:12,797
but it has been held
up as an example
1468
01:25:12,797 --> 01:25:15,282
of Flannery's errant racism.
1469
01:25:16,456 --> 01:25:19,079
- If you just see
the Southern writers,
1470
01:25:19,079 --> 01:25:22,427
generally white Southern
writers on the basis of
1471
01:25:22,427 --> 01:25:25,603
more or less their
racism, which is there,
1472
01:25:25,603 --> 01:25:30,297
nobody should be
locked into ideologies
1473
01:25:30,297 --> 01:25:34,059
that they were born
into and that they often
1474
01:25:34,059 --> 01:25:35,716
were not even able to see.
1475
01:25:37,960 --> 01:25:42,171
So the writers get sold, they
get sold down the river too.
1476
01:25:51,560 --> 01:25:55,357
[singing in foreign language]
1477
01:26:28,355 --> 01:26:29,770
- Flannery had been ill so long
1478
01:26:29,770 --> 01:26:32,187
and her prospects was so dim,
1479
01:26:32,187 --> 01:26:36,156
her cousin Katie wanted
her to go to Lourdes.
1480
01:26:38,365 --> 01:26:41,161
As Flannery said, "it's
her end all and be all
1481
01:26:41,161 --> 01:26:43,128
that I go to Lourdes."
1482
01:26:43,128 --> 01:26:44,785
And Regina wanted to go,
1483
01:26:44,785 --> 01:26:48,237
and Flannery very
reluctantly agreed.
1484
01:26:48,237 --> 01:26:50,757
She said, "I don't
want a miracle.
1485
01:26:50,757 --> 01:26:53,138
I've come to terms with my life.
1486
01:26:53,138 --> 01:26:55,658
I don't want a miracle.
1487
01:26:55,658 --> 01:26:58,558
I want to go right on
doing what I'm doing."
1488
01:26:58,558 --> 01:27:00,801
But she didn't like to
disappoint her cousin.
1489
01:27:01,975 --> 01:27:03,010
- [Newsreader]
Without cessation,
1490
01:27:03,010 --> 01:27:04,529
throughout the day at Lourdes,
1491
01:27:04,529 --> 01:27:07,187
60,000 pilgrims attended
or heard divine services.
1492
01:27:08,395 --> 01:27:11,605
Many will have been ill
and beyond medical aid,
1493
01:27:11,605 --> 01:27:14,194
but hoping to show
on their return
1494
01:27:14,194 --> 01:27:16,265
that their faith
has made them whole.
1495
01:27:18,543 --> 01:27:21,270
- Of course, there
were many people there,
1496
01:27:21,270 --> 01:27:24,687
sick, the lame, the halt
and the blind were there
1497
01:27:24,687 --> 01:27:26,379
and everyone full of hope.
1498
01:27:27,794 --> 01:27:29,830
And it was very touching.
It was very moving.
1499
01:27:31,384 --> 01:27:35,008
But Flannery was still very
reluctant to take the bath.
1500
01:27:35,008 --> 01:27:37,182
She said, "I'm the kind
of Catholic who could
1501
01:27:37,182 --> 01:27:40,082
die for her faith before she
would take a bath for it."
1502
01:27:42,326 --> 01:27:43,844
- For a while, it looked
as though something
1503
01:27:43,844 --> 01:27:45,915
had really happened 'cause
about six months later,
1504
01:27:45,915 --> 01:27:47,952
Regina said to me in
an aside, she said
1505
01:27:47,952 --> 01:27:50,195
the hip had begun to
recalcify and so forth.
1506
01:27:50,195 --> 01:27:51,438
Of course it didn't last.
1507
01:27:55,200 --> 01:27:57,651
- [Narrator] "I have a large
tumor and if they don't
1508
01:27:57,651 --> 01:28:00,654
make haste and get
rid of it, they will
1509
01:28:00,654 --> 01:28:03,036
have to remove me and leave it."
1510
01:28:08,455 --> 01:28:10,492
- She had surgery the next day
1511
01:28:10,492 --> 01:28:14,150
and I had a note from
her when she could write
1512
01:28:14,150 --> 01:28:19,121
saying that the surgery
was a howling success.
1513
01:28:20,295 --> 01:28:22,262
The operation may have
been a howling success,
1514
01:28:22,262 --> 01:28:26,818
but lupus came howling back.
1515
01:28:26,818 --> 01:28:29,165
- I was working with a
dying writer, I knew it.
1516
01:28:31,029 --> 01:28:33,238
We were putting
together her last book,
1517
01:28:33,238 --> 01:28:35,517
"Everything That
Rises Must Converge."
1518
01:28:35,517 --> 01:28:37,588
She was in the
hospital in Atlanta.
1519
01:28:37,588 --> 01:28:40,073
It was, in a way, it was
in kind of a horror story
1520
01:28:40,073 --> 01:28:43,973
because she was so anxious
to get the last story,
1521
01:28:43,973 --> 01:28:47,494
"Revelation," she
wanted that to get in.
1522
01:28:47,494 --> 01:28:51,533
[typewriter keys clicking]
1523
01:28:51,533 --> 01:28:53,189
- There is this
wonderful short story
1524
01:28:53,189 --> 01:28:56,745
about these people in a waiting
room of a doctor's office.
1525
01:28:56,745 --> 01:28:59,092
[people coughing]
1526
01:28:59,092 --> 01:29:03,924
This young woman with this
garish face who is angry at
1527
01:29:03,924 --> 01:29:07,721
the woman who was sitting
across from her, Mrs. Turpin.
1528
01:29:07,721 --> 01:29:11,104
A black delivery man comes in.
1529
01:29:11,104 --> 01:29:12,761
- [Narrator] "'They oughtta
send all them niggers
1530
01:29:12,761 --> 01:29:16,109
back to Africa,' the
white trash woman said.
1531
01:29:16,109 --> 01:29:18,836
'That's where they come
from in the first place.'
1532
01:29:18,836 --> 01:29:22,357
'Oh, I couldn't do without
my good colored friends,'
1533
01:29:22,357 --> 01:29:24,600
the pleasant lady said.
1534
01:29:24,600 --> 01:29:27,051
'There's a heap of things
worse than a nigger,'
1535
01:29:27,051 --> 01:29:29,053
Mrs. Turpin agreed.
1536
01:29:29,053 --> 01:29:31,124
'There's all kinds
of them just like
1537
01:29:31,124 --> 01:29:32,850
there's all kinds of us.
1538
01:29:32,850 --> 01:29:36,716
It wouldn't be practical to
send them all back to Africa.
1539
01:29:36,716 --> 01:29:39,166
They've got it too good here.'"
1540
01:29:39,166 --> 01:29:43,964
- Good satire always has a
center. And she has a center.
1541
01:29:43,964 --> 01:29:47,209
It's a center so
profound that she can see
1542
01:29:47,209 --> 01:29:49,798
everything is distorted
and very funny.
1543
01:29:49,798 --> 01:29:53,249
- Flannery made Mary
Grace this person
1544
01:29:53,249 --> 01:29:56,391
with a sense of rage
that was building.
1545
01:29:59,497 --> 01:30:01,810
- [Narrator] "'Go back to
hell where you came from,
1546
01:30:01,810 --> 01:30:02,983
you old warthog.'"
1547
01:30:06,504 --> 01:30:10,991
- "Revelation" was a bowing of
Flannery to Maryat's concern
1548
01:30:10,991 --> 01:30:15,375
that she not address or
reference issues of race.
1549
01:30:15,375 --> 01:30:19,897
Maryat went to Wellesley,
Mary Grace went to Wellesley.
1550
01:30:19,897 --> 01:30:24,073
The last letter that Flannery
wrote before she died
1551
01:30:24,073 --> 01:30:26,938
was to Maryat, which
I think is a testament
1552
01:30:26,938 --> 01:30:30,528
to the kind of
closeness they had.
1553
01:30:30,528 --> 01:30:34,256
- [Narrator] "Sometimes
Mrs. Turpin occupied herself
1554
01:30:34,256 --> 01:30:37,639
at night naming the
classes of people.
1555
01:30:37,639 --> 01:30:41,539
On the bottom of the heap
were most colored people.
1556
01:30:41,539 --> 01:30:44,162
Not the kind she would have
been if she'd been one,
1557
01:30:44,162 --> 01:30:45,716
but most of them.
1558
01:30:45,716 --> 01:30:49,685
Then next to them, not
above, just away from,
1559
01:30:49,685 --> 01:30:51,687
were the white trash.
1560
01:30:51,687 --> 01:30:55,346
Then above them
were the homeowners.
1561
01:30:55,346 --> 01:30:59,074
And above them, the
home and landowners,
1562
01:30:59,074 --> 01:31:01,490
to which she and Claud belonged.
1563
01:31:01,490 --> 01:31:03,803
Usually by the time
she'd fallen asleep,
1564
01:31:03,803 --> 01:31:07,047
all the classes of people were
moiling and roiling around
1565
01:31:07,047 --> 01:31:09,912
in her head and she
would dream they were all
1566
01:31:09,912 --> 01:31:13,951
crammed in together in a
boxcar being ridden off
1567
01:31:13,951 --> 01:31:15,884
to be put in a gas oven."
1568
01:31:17,782 --> 01:31:20,164
[soft music]
1569
01:31:23,098 --> 01:31:24,340
- She always worked.
1570
01:31:24,340 --> 01:31:27,309
As long as she was able
to work, she worked.
1571
01:31:27,309 --> 01:31:29,967
Even in the hospital
she was making notes
1572
01:31:29,967 --> 01:31:32,452
or observations, certainly.
1573
01:31:33,729 --> 01:31:35,628
[pen scratching]
1574
01:31:35,628 --> 01:31:37,837
- "The sun was behind
the wood, very red.
1575
01:31:37,837 --> 01:31:39,701
Looking over the paling of trees
1576
01:31:39,701 --> 01:31:42,704
like a farmer
inspecting his own hogs.
1577
01:31:43,739 --> 01:31:46,777
'Why me?' She rumbled.
1578
01:31:46,777 --> 01:31:49,055
'It's no trash around
here, black or white,
1579
01:31:49,055 --> 01:31:52,748
that I haven't given to and
break my back to the bone
1580
01:31:52,748 --> 01:31:56,683
every day working,
and do for the church.
1581
01:31:56,683 --> 01:31:58,202
Go on!' She yelled,
1582
01:31:58,202 --> 01:32:03,138
'Call me a hog, call
me a warthog from hell.
1583
01:32:04,070 --> 01:32:05,796
Put that bottom rail on top.
1584
01:32:05,796 --> 01:32:08,833
There'll still be
a top and bottom.'
1585
01:32:10,283 --> 01:32:14,667
A final surge of fury
shook her and she roared,
1586
01:32:14,667 --> 01:32:17,324
'Who do you think you are?'"
1587
01:32:18,912 --> 01:32:19,982
It's so good.
1588
01:32:21,466 --> 01:32:24,021
[somber music]
1589
01:32:33,099 --> 01:32:36,516
- We found a calender
in Regina's room,
1590
01:32:36,516 --> 01:32:39,208
and it was turned
to August of '64.
1591
01:32:40,416 --> 01:32:42,833
And on the day Flannery died,
1592
01:32:42,833 --> 01:32:46,906
Regina had written "death
came for Flannery."
1593
01:32:48,148 --> 01:32:50,772
- I'm really sorry she
died at the age of 39.
1594
01:32:52,428 --> 01:32:53,706
Iúthink that both
my parents thought
1595
01:32:53,706 --> 01:33:00,126
that she was with
God, so it was okay.
1596
01:33:03,129 --> 01:33:05,994
- She looks at the
darkness unflinchingly
1597
01:33:05,994 --> 01:33:10,550
and she approaches it with
clarity and with precision.
1598
01:33:11,724 --> 01:33:13,967
And that I think
is her greatness.
1599
01:33:15,382 --> 01:33:19,007
- I feel that that
Flannery O'Connor's life
1600
01:33:19,007 --> 01:33:22,527
and Flannery O'Connor's
work were all of a piece.
1601
01:33:23,977 --> 01:33:27,429
They were both returns of
her gifts, her talents.
1602
01:33:27,429 --> 01:33:29,500
She considered her faith a gift.
1603
01:33:29,500 --> 01:33:31,191
She considered
her talent a gift.
1604
01:33:32,710 --> 01:33:36,576
And she wanted to
return them with gain.
1605
01:33:37,957 --> 01:33:39,786
And I think she did.
1606
01:33:39,786 --> 01:33:44,757
I think her life is almost
as imposing as her work.
1607
01:33:48,726 --> 01:33:51,315
- She's one of the best
writers of the 20th century.
1608
01:33:52,488 --> 01:33:54,214
I've read everything
that she's written
1609
01:33:58,943 --> 01:34:02,464
- The life of Flannery O'Connor
and what she had to offer
1610
01:34:02,464 --> 01:34:05,985
in terms of her relationship
to the greater mysteries
1611
01:34:05,985 --> 01:34:08,643
of existence are going
to be things that people
1612
01:34:08,643 --> 01:34:10,990
will tap into because
they aren't going away.
1613
01:34:13,164 --> 01:34:15,891
- "At length, she got down
and turned off the faucet
1614
01:34:15,891 --> 01:34:20,275
and made her slow way on the
darkening path to the house.
1615
01:34:20,275 --> 01:34:23,761
In the woods around her, the
invisible cricket choruses
1616
01:34:23,761 --> 01:34:27,385
had struck up, but what
she heard were the voices
1617
01:34:27,385 --> 01:34:31,493
of the souls climbing
upward into the starry field
1618
01:34:31,493 --> 01:34:33,357
and shouting, 'Hallelujah!'"
1619
01:34:47,578 --> 01:34:50,788
[soft harmonica music]
1620
01:35:02,282 --> 01:35:07,184
♪ I saw her standin'
on her front lawn ♪
1621
01:35:09,462 --> 01:35:14,467
♪ Just-a twirlin' her baton
1622
01:35:16,918 --> 01:35:21,888
♪ Me and her went
for a ride, sir ♪
1623
01:35:25,202 --> 01:35:30,172
♪ And ten innocent people died
1624
01:35:32,105 --> 01:35:37,076
♪ From the town of
Lincoln, Nebraska ♪
1625
01:35:39,181 --> 01:35:44,152
♪ With a sawed off
.410 on my lap ♪
1626
01:35:46,913 --> 01:35:51,884
♪ Through to the
badlands of Wyoming ♪
1627
01:35:54,507 --> 01:35:58,545
♪ I killed everything
in my path ♪
1628
01:36:09,660 --> 01:36:14,665
♪ I can't say that I'm sorry
1629
01:36:16,771 --> 01:36:21,776
♪ For the things that we done
1630
01:36:24,330 --> 01:36:29,300
♪ At least for a
little while, sir ♪
1631
01:36:31,889 --> 01:36:35,859
♪ Me and her we
had us some fun ♪
125027
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