Reactions To Social Change

Flannery O'Connor is one of the most important South American writers. Heridentity as a Catholic guides her literary creation, rendering her fiction peculiar, apartfrom its common features, in Southern literature. Most critics in China and overseashave attained thoughtful insights by interpreting her oeuvre from the perspective ofreligion; some other reviewers, starting from the shared characteristics of Southernliterature, examined in her fiction some acknowledged themes and writing styles inSouthern literary genre, such as race issue and grotesquery. This thesis is an effort toexplore in her works a grander theme related to the region, social change, byintegrating the analyses of O'Connor's life experiences and religious beliefs, and tosurvey, from the special lens of the Catholic writer, the contemporary changingSouthern society.In this study I will discuss three types of characters' attitudes and responses tosocial transformation in O'Connor's short stories, the subjects mainly falling upon thedownfallen upper- and middle-class whites and their offspring, along with sporadicdiscussions of other social classes and black people. People of the first group arethose who have completely lost their property and status, live together with theirchildren, and recall the sweet past all day long. Their anachronism constitutes thefundamental reason for the dissension between them and their descendants, and theirmisfortune at last signals the expiry of the old ideas. There also exist some othersenior whites who still possess some pieces of land, and try stubbornly to maintainthe traditional mode of production to manage their farms, most of which have alreadybeen ruined. Every so often they make some adjustments, but their conceptionremains intact. However, there is an exception within this type of people- the oldman in the story actively supporting social advances-but the protagonist's deathmirrors the immense resistance in the course of social change. The last band of peopleto be discussed is the young generation. Under the social conditions at that time, theytend to be liberal and radical, but their progressive thoughts meet repulsion from theconservative forces, and moreover, a few youths fail to completely get rid of theideological influences of their parents.In depicting the characters of each group, O'Connor is far from just repeating;instead, she attaches great importance to disclosing the differences among them. Theportrayal of characters in this way demonstrates O'Connor's observation of theSouthern society and concern for people's livelihood. She has the enlightenment as afemale intellectual on the one hand, and she possesses conservatism innately relatedto her Catholic faith and shows considerable sympathy for the vanishing old forces onthe other hand; hence the ambivalence and complexity of her attitude toward socialchange.