Remember me? It has been a while, but summer is here and my first year back teaching is complete, so I thought it would be fun to host some summer reading discussions at Jonathan-Rogers.com. My biography of Flannery O’Connor–The Terrible Speed of Mercy–will be released later this summer, so why don’t we read through some of her stories? Each Monday from now through the end of August I will post an article about one of O’Connor’s stories (see the schedule below). I hope to post follow-up articles each week as well, but my blogging muscles are atrophied after so long, so I’d better not commit to more than the Monday article each week. I hope you’ll be moved to lively discussion about these stories, which can be quite controversial.
We’ll start Monday, June 4, with “A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” a story that you have likely read already. It is also the only story that you can hear read by the author; click here for scratchy but amazing audio of O’Connor reading “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” at Vanderbilt).
Here is the schedule for the Flannery O’Connor Summer Reading Club:
Week of June 4: “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”
Week of June 11: “The Life You Save May Be Your Own”
Week of June 18: “The River”
Week of June 25: “The Displaced Person”
Week of July 2: “A Temple of the Holy Ghost”
Week of July 16: “Good Country People”
Week of July 23: “Greenleaf”
Week of July 30: “A View of the Woods”
Week of August 6: “The Enduring Chill”
Week of August 13: “Everything that Rises Must Converge”
Week of August 20: “Revelation”
Week of August 27: “Parker’s Back”
All of these stories appear in The Complete Stories. I hope you’ll be able to join in the conversation.
Micah Hawkinson
Hooray! Welcome back to the Internets. Really looking forward to hearing what you have to say about F. O’C. 🙂
Charles Atkinson
Great to see this- count me in!
Cheers,
Charles
Becca
Golly, I’m pumped about this.
Charee
Jonathan,So glad you are back. I am not a blog reader in general, but always found myself looking for what you and your readers had to say. I will try to read along with you this summer. Who doesn’t love a hot summer day with a book and a glass of iced tea? Your love and presentation of Flannery will be contagious.
Canaan Bound
Yay!!!!!!!!!!!!! 🙂 🙂 🙂
Caleb
Saw this over on the Rabbit Room. What a great idea! I’ve read all the short stories but have wanted to do it again. This is the perfect opportunity. I’m in.
Loren Warnemuende
Welcome back to blogging, Jonathan! I’m going to try to take the plunge and join in on some of these–see if I can actually get somewhere with O’Connor. My interest has been piqued again with numerous references to her work in a book I’m reading: “Reading Like a Writer,” by Francine Prose.
Charles Atkinson
Rebound effect, Loren! You’ve re-piqued my interest to finish Prose’s book. I’ve been meaning to pick it up again but lost it a year ago when the car I was in broke down in the backwoods three hours west of Jacksonville. We left the car (and the book) to collect rust (and dust) at the mechanic’s. I never made it to a reference to Flannery because of that strange Flannery-like adventure [we eventually did make it back to DC alive in a rental, and gained a breakfast at Meme’s Cafe to boot].
Thank you!
Cheers,
Charles
Loren Warnemuende
Too funny, Charles. Do get back to Prose. It’s been a great read. I realized that my love for inductive Bible is not very different to my enjoyment of taking literature apart piece by piece. I just usually don’t do that with books these days because I’m not teaching. That’s just one of the things I’ve enjoyed about it.