Wise Blood, Flannery O'Connor's first novel, is the story of Hazel Motes who, released from the armed services, returns to the evangelical Deep South. There he begins a private battle against the religiosity of the community and in particular against Asa Hawkes, the 'blind' preacher, and his degenerate fifteen-year-old daughter. In desperation Hazel founds his own religion, 'The Church without Christ', and this extraordinary narrative moves towards its savage and macabre resolution.
'A literary talent that has about it the uniqueness of greatness.' Sunday Telegraph
'No other major American writer of our century has constructed a fictional world so energetically and forthrightly charged by religious investigation.' The New Yorker
'A genius.' New York Times
After the false start a few months ago, I’m shocked by how good this was, how quickly I got into it, how deeply funny and cutting the satire. Revisiting it was so worth it. Flannery’s view of humanity is just as evisceratingly dim — her people and religion aren’t Gothic, they’re grotesque— but its comedy is so twisty and its lack of sympathy so relentless, it pretty much backfires on itself, luring you over into compassion for all these hobbled-up souls. Hazel Motes defected on my sympathy at the end, pushing me over the line into just wanting to shake him apart, but young Enoch was my favorite, the one with wise blood, goofy in his earnestness, stealing his “new jesus.”
Enoch’s brain was divided into two parts. The part in communication with his blood did the figuring but it never said anything in words. The other part was stocked up with all kinds of words and phrases. While the first part was figuring out how to get Hazel Motes through the Frosty Bottle and the zoo, the second inquired, “Where’d you get thisyer fine car? You ought to paint you some signs on the outside it, like ‘Step-in, baby’— I seen one with that on it, and then I seen another, said...”
Hazel Motes’s face might have been cut out of the side of a rock.
“My daddy once owned a yeller Ford automobile he won on a ticket,” Enoch murmured. “It had a roll-top and two aerials and a squirrel tail all come with it. He swapped it off. Stop here! Stop here!” he yelled— they were passing the Frosty Bottle.
Flannery’s so good at these little flesh and blood moments. Why this doesn’t endear humanity to her, why it must consign them instead to hellfire and damnation, is a mystery I can’t unravel.
Reading updates
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Started reading
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25 May, 2012:
Finished reading
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25 May, 2012:
Reviewed