Wise Blood: A Novel (FSG Classics)
The American short story master Flannery O'Connor's haunting first novel of faith, false prophets, and redemptive wisdom.
Wise Blood, Flannery O'Connor's astonishing and haunting first novel, is a classic of twentieth-century literature. It is the story of Hazel Motes, a twenty-two-year-old caught in an unending struggle against his inborn, desperate fate. He falls under the spell of a "blind" street preacher named Asa Hawks and his degenerate fifteen-year-old daughter, Sabbath Lily. In an ironic, malicious gesture of his own non-faith, and to prove himself a greater cynic than Hawks, Motes founds the Church Without Christ, but is still thwarted in his efforts to lose God. He meets Enoch Emery, a young man with "wise blood," who leads him to a mummified holy child and whose crazy maneuvers are a manifestation of Motes's existential struggles.
This tale of redemption, retribution, false prophets, blindness, blindings, and wisdom gives us one of the most riveting characters in American fiction.
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Community Reviews
This is very much like a longer version of one of O'Connor's stories. Some of those stories are great. Most of them are very shallow caricatures engaging in bizarre behavior that often makes very little sense in terms of human motivations and only really works on a symbolic or a comic level (or both). Her humor is dark and ironic. It is often subtle, but often so not subtle that you end up thinking to yourself "This is funny but I don't know if Flannery wants it to be". I personally find that this phenomenon often distracts quite a lot from the symbolism. Another barrier to the symbolism is the fact that she often chooses strange vehicles for the symbolism. She also generally tries to give the reader as little as possible overt indications. She will just present a pattern of behavior and expect you to make a leap based on what you know the theme is. That would be really hard except for the fact that her theme is ALWAYS god's grace, man's fallibility, or the idea that atheists are problem child, running away from the Truth they know is true, and sometimes mass murderers that do evil to prove their atheism is correct.
So for example, in this novel the main character buys a car and insists that is a perfectly fine car that can take him anywhere just as well as any other car on the road even though it is obviously falling apart. That's symbolic for the illusion that modern technology can make us self-reliant and not need God's Grace. It finally stops working after it ... enables a major sin ... and the main character is trying to escape god's grace. A cop pulls him over, says he doesn't like his face, and then pushes the car into a ditch, and oila! our main character now has a spiritual epiphany. ALL of the character development is taking place in the symbolism. And if you didn't pick up on that symbolism in the car, or if you interpret it differently, it will potentially mess up your reading of the end. Of course, if you just rely on the old standby - characters discover god's grace in the end! atheists are stupid and dumb and just try to negate religion and do evil like misbehaving children just to rebel against god's authority! - you'll make at least some sense out of it.
Any way, this stuff works well in some of her short stories. But in a novel length story, not so much. And once you've read a few, you've read them all. This isn't necessarily bad writing, but it's boring, formulaic, edgy, and just too much of a muchness.
So for example, in this novel the main character buys a car and insists that is a perfectly fine car that can take him anywhere just as well as any other car on the road even though it is obviously falling apart. That's symbolic for the illusion that modern technology can make us self-reliant and not need God's Grace. It finally stops working after it ... enables a major sin ... and the main character is trying to escape god's grace. A cop pulls him over, says he doesn't like his face, and then pushes the car into a ditch, and oila! our main character now has a spiritual epiphany. ALL of the character development is taking place in the symbolism. And if you didn't pick up on that symbolism in the car, or if you interpret it differently, it will potentially mess up your reading of the end. Of course, if you just rely on the old standby - characters discover god's grace in the end! atheists are stupid and dumb and just try to negate religion and do evil like misbehaving children just to rebel against god's authority! - you'll make at least some sense out of it.
Any way, this stuff works well in some of her short stories. But in a novel length story, not so much. And once you've read a few, you've read them all. This isn't necessarily bad writing, but it's boring, formulaic, edgy, and just too much of a muchness.
I'm new to the world of reading classics for fun. (High school and college-forced reading don't count)
This is my first experience reading Flannery O'Connor and it turned out to be a delightful first choice to discover her as an author.
This review is completely subjective to me individually - I do understand that some folks don't find narratives that poke fun at religion as enjoyable - so if that describes you, I'd steer clear of this one. As a Southern Baptist who made sure the back pew never collected any dust and always first out the back door as to be first in line for the fried chicken in the Fellowship Hall, I found this tale HYSTERICAL.
We have a young man freshly home from serving in the war to find his childhood home empty, family is dead or gone. Hazel Motes, or Haze is his name. Haze decides to pick up and keep moving down the road and ends up in a little town down the way where a chance encounter with a preacher causes him to realize his own non-faith. Upon realizing he doesn't believe in Jesus, he decides to become a rival preacher and start his own church, aptly named Church Without Christ.
The characters are all completely off their rockers, hilarious and more unpredictable than Punxsutawney Phil.
Just an overall enjoyable story, one I will definitely look forward to reading time and again.
This is my first experience reading Flannery O'Connor and it turned out to be a delightful first choice to discover her as an author.
This review is completely subjective to me individually - I do understand that some folks don't find narratives that poke fun at religion as enjoyable - so if that describes you, I'd steer clear of this one. As a Southern Baptist who made sure the back pew never collected any dust and always first out the back door as to be first in line for the fried chicken in the Fellowship Hall, I found this tale HYSTERICAL.
We have a young man freshly home from serving in the war to find his childhood home empty, family is dead or gone. Hazel Motes, or Haze is his name. Haze decides to pick up and keep moving down the road and ends up in a little town down the way where a chance encounter with a preacher causes him to realize his own non-faith. Upon realizing he doesn't believe in Jesus, he decides to become a rival preacher and start his own church, aptly named Church Without Christ.
The characters are all completely off their rockers, hilarious and more unpredictable than Punxsutawney Phil.
Just an overall enjoyable story, one I will definitely look forward to reading time and again.