Jacques Maritain & Flannery O’Connor: Imitation & Distortion: The Power of the Story

Abstract Flannery O’ Connor’s mom criticized her for not writing what people would want to read. While O’Connor’s novels are full of freaks and distortions, this article offers some philosophical clues as to why this is so. We explore Jacques Maritain’s influence upon her as she saw herself as ‘cutting her aesthetic teeth upon his Art and Scholasticism ’. Key to understanding the grotesque world of O’Connor’s stories is the understanding of Maritain’s notion of artistic imitation and its reliance upon his notion of distortion. It is the latter notion that gives us the central insight into why she distorted her characters and plot. True storytelling for O’Connor plunges the reader deeply into reality, especially into the reality of human persons. Not wanting to stay at the physical surfaces of things, distortion plunges the reader into the depth of human character and their existential aspirations, motivations, decisions, and especially, their responses to the gift of supernatural grace.