Flannery O'Connor: Southern writer made Catholic vision 'apparent by shock'

Flannery O'Connor: Southern writer made Catholic vision 'apparent by shock'

Flannery O’Connor was not an evangelist. She was an artist, one of the most gifted American fiction writers of the 20th century. But a profoundly Catholic theological vision informs her art, giving her stories resonance and depth that sound deep — and sometimes deeply disturbing — spiritual chords. Explaining why she often wrote about grotesque characters in bizarre situations, O’Connor remarked that in an age of disbelief like this one, “You ha…