Publisher Description

This girl is a real novelist," wrote Caroline Gordon about Flannery O'Connor upon being asked to review a manuscript of O'Connor's first novel, Wise Blood. "She is already a rare phenomenon: a Catholic novelist with a real dramatic sense, one who relies more on her technique than her piety."

This collection of letters and other documents offers the most complete portrait of the relationship between two of the American South's most acclaimed twentieth-century writers: Flannery O'Connor and Caroline Gordon. Gordon (1895–1981) had herself been a protégée of an important novelist, Ford Madox Ford, before publishing nine novels and three short story collections of her own, most notably, The Forest of the South and Old Red and Other Stories, and she would offer insights and friendship to O'Connor during almost all of O'Connor's career.

As revealed in this collection of correspondence, Gordon's thirteen-year friendship with O'Connor (1925–64) and the critiques of O'Connor's fiction that she wrote during this time not only fostered each writer's career but occasioned a remarkable series of letters full of insights about the craft of writing. Gordon, a more established writer at the start of their correspondence, acted as a mentor to the younger O'Connor and their letters reveal Gordon's strong hand in shaping some of O'Connor's most acclaimed work, including Wise Blood, A Good Man Is Hard to Find and The Displaced Person.

Author Biography

Christine Flanagan is a professor of English at the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia. A recipient of the Lindback Foundation Award for Distinguished Teaching, Flanagan is a faculty member in the University Honors Program, faculty advisor for the Elixir (the USciences' literary journal), and coordinator of the Misher Festival of Fine Arts and Humanities. She lives in Haddonfield, New Jersey.

Review

The Letters of Flannery O'Connor and Caroline Gordon. . .throw[s] into fresh relief the tension of O'Connor's being confined, geographically, to the rim of the literary world just as, professionally, she established her place in its hub.--Sean Johnson "FORMA Review"
In The Letters of Flannery O'Connor and Caroline Gordon, the editor Christine Flanagan gathers an admirable collection that traces the fascinating relationship between two women committed to both their Catholic faith and the craft of fiction. Yet unlike much of O'Connor's correspondence with others, this one stands out as a kind of student-teacher relationship in which O'Connor, at least in the beginning, is the gifted student and Gordon the seasoned, exacting teacher.--Maura Shea "America Magazine"

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Newly published correspondence that sheds light on two literary luminaries

Long Description

"This girl is a real novelist," wrote Caroline Gordon about Flannery O'Connor upon being asked to review a manuscript of O'Connor's first novel, Wise Blood . "She is already a rare phenomenon: a Catholic novelist with a real dramatic sense, one who relies more on her technique than her piety." This collection of letters and other documents offers the most complete portrait of the relationship between two of the American South's most acclaimed twentieth-century writers: Flannery O'Connor and Caroline Gordon. Gordon (1895-1981) had herself been a prot

Review Quote

While O'Connor's status as the preeminent author of Southern Catholic literature won't be changing anytime soon, Flanagan has given us many reasons to believe that Gordon helped get her there. Indeed, Flanagan makes a sensible case that Gordon's own fiction-long considered second fiddle to the works of O'Connor, Walker Percy, and other Southern Catholic mavens-deserves a fresh valuation.

Promotional "Headline"

Newly published correspondence that sheds light on two literary luminaries

Description for Reader

CHRISTINE FLANAGAN is a professor of English at the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia. A recipient of the Lindback Foundation Award for Distinguished Teaching, Flanagan is a faculty member in the University Honors Program, faculty advisor for the Elixir (the USciences' literary journal), and coordinator of the Misher Festival of Fine Arts and Humanities. She lives in Haddonfield, New Jersey.

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