Flannery O'Connor's enduring wisdom

[Doug Zimmerman]

 

Ladies and Gentlemen,

 

     I present for your reading pleasure Miss Flannery O’Connor’s Mystery and Manners: Occasional Prose.  Published by Farrar, Straus, and Giroux in 1969, five years after O’Connor’s untimely death at the age of 39, this mentor craft/idea essay collection reveals a Southern author of deep religious conviction and unquestioned talent.  Through such pieces as the opener, “The King of the Birds,” readers gain a true sense of this staunch Catholic and her reverence for God’s mysterious and beautiful creations.  Teachers of writing and literature in all grades will no doubt sympathize with, or partially agree with, O’Connor in “Total Effect and the Eighth Grade” when she professes “that fiction, if it is going to be taught in the high schools, should be taught as a subject and as a subject with a history” (137).  She continues in her unabashed fashion avowing that,

The total effect of a novel depends not only on its innate impact, but upon the experience, literary and otherwise, with which it is approached.  No child needs to be assigned Hersey or Steinbeck until he is familiar with a certain amount of the best work of Cooper, Hawthorne, Melville, the early James, and Crane, and he does not need to be assigned these until he has been introduced to some of the better English novelists of the eighteenth century. (137-8)

Her main invective – and perhaps it is just as true today as it was for O’Connor in 1963 when she wrote the essay – is that many students continue on to college without realizing that the world and the texts in it were “not made yesterday” (138).  She reasons that if a World History class does not begin with WWII, then why should a Literature class?  And in the same vein, why should a writing class? 

My questions for you, dear friends, then, are these: 

1. Are Literature classes still offered in high schools, and, if they are offered, how are they taught?  If they are not offered, do you think they should be?  Would these classes offer British Literature, American Literature, or perhaps World Literature?  Would the texts be early or modern works?  And should that matter as long as students read and understand that there is more in the world of words than e-mails and texting?

2. How might a “history of writing” impact student understanding?  That is, might such a history prepare students for why particular writing assignments are given and why those same assignments might not be given in other classes or in other years?  I think students understand why they must learn mathematics before algebra and algebra before calculus.  But are we explaining why they must learn basic sentence structure before adding modifiers, phrases, etc.?  And why they must learn all of those before organizing effective paragraphs and so forth?  Or are we as writing teachers assuming that, like math, the steps are so plainly obvious that we need not mention them?

     I realize the amount of questions I ask and I certainly do not expect you to address them all.  But that is the beauty of O’Connor’s collection.  From one essay, I extracted all of the above ideas; plenty of others reside within the collection’s pages.  For those of you with a bent toward fiction writing, essays such as “The Nature and Aim of Fiction” and “Writing Short Stories” are right up your alley.  O’Connor again talks about pedagogy in “The Teaching of Literature,” a composite of talks she gave to an English teaching cohort.  Whether you want to catch a glimpse behind a gifted Southern writer’s veil, or you want to bask in the strength of easy prose, Mystery and Manners cannot be beat.  Enjoy.

 

 

O’Connor, Flannery. (1969). Mystery and manners: Occasional prose. New York:Farrar, Straus, and Giroux.

[Laurel Topken]

Doug,

To answer your questions, I must make some assumptions because my experience is more as a mother than as a teacher in the level you are asking about.  What I have seen of the English classes in Churchill County High are that the writing and literature are combined.  I am not sure of the level of instruction that goes into each portion as they work on literature at the same time they are writing their big papers.  But the literature seems to be read in class, answer questions weekly, do a group project at the end of the book.  There are 4 books a year and each grade are assigned certain books.  I do wonder how popular literature classes would be at this level and what type of literature would appeal to these students.  Granted, as an English teacher, I see the benefits of this, but from the logistics and budgeting aspects would these classes benefit the students enough to offer? 

As far as your second question, I believe like math the students accept that they must learn one aspect before they move on.  Since both these subjects are offered right from the beginning of their school career, I believe that it is understood that each grade level the students would learn more and attempt harder levels of the same subjects.  I never any complaints about what they are teaching when it comes to writing.  So I don't believe that the "history of writing" would be necessary or even appreciated at this level.

 

Great questions.

 

Laurel

 

[Megan Garijo Pruitt]

Hi Doug!

First of all I wanted to tell you that I enjoy reading your writing - your style is unique and fun to read! 

 

--It is teachers like you that can develop students' appreciation of literature, all genres, early and modern.  I do not know exactly what is taught in high school english classes today, but I know from my high school experiences, I did not get introduced to important works of writing.  Is it the writing that is important in the works you are describing or is it the topics that are written about?  Since the style of writing by O'Connor in 1969 is most likely different than what students are used to today, how DO you develop an appreciation of classic writing?

 

I would like to check this book out to further explore some of the questions you posed such as how might a “history of writing” impact student understanding?  Very interesting topics!!  Thanks for the thinking, Doug!

[Sarah Flynn]

Hi Doug,
I have a high school English teacher for a partner in my job and our conversations seem to be the limit of my knowledge. I do know that each grade level has specific literature that they must teach from and writing instruction is combined. The list of literature is set and one cannot deviate from it. I love the idea of teaching from British or American. Wouldn't it be an exciting thing to give kids choices? I personally would have chosen British Literature, but what a fun class "History of British Writing" could be as well. I only remember reading The Odyssey though and I'm sure that is probably still on one of the lists. Loved the Mystery and Manners teaser you threw in at the end. I'll have to check that out.
Thanks for the thoughts ~ Sarah