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Flannery O’Connor Biography Reveals the Famously Misunderstood Catholic | Lifestyle. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Paul Engle was the director of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop when the young O’Connor walked into his office asking to be admitted to the program. Engle writes:
O’Connor, after all, grew up on a farm, and once taught a chicken how to walk backwards.
She came out of the red dirt country of Georgia. She walked into my office one day and spoke to me. I understood nothing, not one syllable. As far as I knew, she was saying, "Aaaaraaaraaarah." My God, I thought to myself, this is a retarded young girl. Then I looked at her eyes. They were crossed! Finally, I said, excuse me, my name is Paul Engle. I gave her a pad -- believe me, this is true -- and said would you please write down what you’re telling me. And she wrote, "My name is Flannery O’Connor. I’m from Milledgeville, Georgia. I’m a writer."
O’Connor, after all, grew up on a farm, and once taught a chicken how to walk backwards.
Perhaps I should take this as a sign: I should revisit a Flannery O’Connor and share at my blog my understanding of the misunderstood Georgia prophet.
ReplyDeleteIt is easy to forget now what radio and then TV have done to smooth out American regional accents. Iowa or western Illinois was more or less the "reference" pronunciation that broadcasters aimed at. I can easily imagine an Iowan baffled by the sounds of Milledgeville.
ReplyDeleteFor what it's worth, O'Connor didn't grow up on a farm. Until she was 15, she lived among other Irish Catholics on a square in downtown Savannah. That blog post implies that her drawl was that of a farm girl, but I've always thought of it as something much more distinctive, like William F. Buckley's manner of speech: a product of geography and culture, yes, but also a deliberate expression of forceful individuality.
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