“A CATHOLIC PECULIARLY POSSESSED OF THE MODERN CONSCIOUSNESS”: MYSTERY AND MODERNITY IN FLANNERY O’CONNOR’S FICTION

Abstract

In this thesis, I argue that O’Connor’s exceptional success as a staunchly Catholic writer amongst secular readers can be attributed to how in and through her fiction, she allows the eyes of the Church and her own modern eyes to enrich each other. First, I elucidate how O’Connor’s Catholic vision enables her to enlarge the possibilities of the modernist symbol by reconceiving it to incarnate divine presence in “Greenleaf.” The complexity and depth of O’Connor’s symbols can be seen as qualities she learnt from the modernist literature which she studied extensively. Yet, continuing from where critics stop at identifying the uniquely anagogical dimension of O’Connor’s symbols, I thoroughly analyse how O’Connor combines tangibility, believability, and mystery in her symbols to make it reasonable for readers to believe that divine presence coexists with earthly reality in “Greenleaf.” Next, I evaluate the role of O’Connor’s modern consciousness in her fiction, showing how O’Connor evolves approaches to Catholicism alongside modern circumstances through dialogism in “A Temple of the Holy Ghost.” My analysis contributes to the existing body of criticism which has either commented on “Temple” or applied Mikhail Bakhtin’s concepts to O’Connor, by adopting the hardly-pursued angle of examining the dialogues between traditional and modern voices of faith in “Temple.” I propose that O’Connor depicts coexistence between varied voices of faith, alongside each expression of dogma being subject to further dialogisation, thus leading to the prescient conception of Catholicism as an ever-expanding polyphony of voices. The boundlessness of this polyphony emphasises to readers how human understanding can be continuously nourished by, yet never encompass, the spiritual reality of mystery. Read as a whole, this thesis contributes a deeper appreciation of how O’Connor’s fiction neither reproduces nor dismisses each worldview it engages with, but rather realises and expands its possibilities.