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{"id":4134,"date":"2008-04-16T00:30:12","date_gmt":"2008-04-16T05:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/community\/jesuscreed\/2008\/04\/16\/on-reading-fiction-2\/"},"modified":"2013-04-06T08:32:03","modified_gmt":"2013-04-06T13:32:03","slug":"on-reading-fiction-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2008\/04\/16\/on-reading-fiction-2\/","title":{"rendered":"On Reading Fiction 2"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

I\u2019m doing a series with Dan deRoulet, author of <\/em>Finding Your Plot in a Plotless World<\/a>, on how to read fiction, a lesson I needed long ago. We are using Flannery O\u2019Connor\u2019s \u201cRevelation\u201d (<\/em>Collected Works<\/a><\/em>) as our example, and this is part two. This post is by Dan.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/em>Scot sells himself short on \u201cnot knowing how to read fiction.\u201d After all, he and his colleagues such as Klyne Snodgrass teach their students about the parables of Jesus\u2013some of the most difficult stories to read well. I\u2019m in the midst of peddling a second book project called, Fear Not: Why the Church (and Everyone Else) Needs Dangerous Christian Fiction<\/em>. Flannery O\u2019Connor\u2019s works are at the top of the list.<\/p>\n

Scot correctly summarizes O\u2019Connor\u2019s \u201cRevelation\u201d\u2013 I\u2019ll emphasize a couple of other plot points in a moment. A good way of reading short fiction is to look at and for a few key elements of a story\u2019s structure:<\/p>\n

its exposition <\/em>(the opening scene where the setting, characters, and conflict are keys);<\/p>\n

the crisis <\/em>(where the story\u2019s protagonist has his or her view of the world usually turned on its head);<\/p>\n

and a following period of frustration and reflection leading up to the \u201cepiphany<\/em>\u201c\u2013the moment for the protagonist where the answer to the problem is made clear.<\/p>\n

Jesus\u2019 story of the prodigal son follows this pattern: exposition (conflict between the father, younger son and older brother); crisis (where the son, thinking all will be well if he could just exercise his will, leaves his father\u2019s house in anger and wastes his life in riotous living); and epiphany (where the prodigal recognizes, as he communes with the pigs and lusts after their food, what he had and has given up by leaving his father). This parable, by the way, is not insignificant for O\u2019Connor\u2019s story.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s start with O\u2019Connor and her exposition in \u201cRevelation.\u201d O\u2019Connor loves irony, and loves to portray her protagonists (often Christians) as people who have grown to believe that the facade they display for others is an accurate reflection of their inner life. But it\u2019s not. The protagonist, Mrs. Turpin (one of my students once called her \u201cMrs. Turpentine\u201d), is stuck in the exposition\u2019s setting\u2013a doctor\u2019s waiting room in the pre-civil rights deep South. Obviously, a doctor\u2019s office is a place where the sick wait to see a physician. O\u2019Connor wants to make the distinction between those who need a doctor to fix their visible illnesses and those who are in need of a physician to diagnose what might well kill them on the inside. She and another woman, who are well-mannered and are neither \u201cwhite trash\u201d nor African American nor ill-mannered, think they\u2019re just fine; everyone else in their eyes is, well, unclean. Mrs. Turpin becomes so thankful, as she looks around the room at who she is not, that she shouts out a prayer of thanks to Jesus. The East coast educated young girl Scot describes then hurls a book (Human Development) at her and hits her \u201cdirectly above her left eye.\u201d The girl (named Mary Grace), walks over to Mrs. Turpin and whispers to her, \u201cGo back to Hell where you came from, you old wart hog.\u201d Mrs. Turpin, now lying on the floor, is literally now experiencing changes in her vision, and eventually will struggle with how she has come to see the world.<\/p>\n

So, Scot, two questions I would ask at this point are: which of Jesus\u2019s stories is echoed by the exposition and crisis, and where does Mrs. Turpin end up after she leaves the doctor\u2019s office for her period of reflection and eventual epiphany?
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll answer these questions tomorrow.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"