Flannery O'Connor: From Mysteries and Manners
"I often ask myself what makes a story work, and what makes it hold up as a story and I have decided that it is probably some action, some gesture of a character that is unlike any other in the story, one which indicates where the real heart of the story lies. This would have to be an action or gesture which was both totally right and totally unexpected; it would have to be one that was both in character and beyond character; it would have to suggest both the world and eternity. The action or gesture I'm talking about would have to be on an anagogical level, that is, the level which has to do with the Divine life and our participation in it. It would be a gesture that would transcend any neat allegory that might have been intended or any pat moral categories a reader could make. It would be a gesture which somehow made contact with mystery. "
Midori Snyder is the author of nine books for children and adults, published in English, French, Dutch, and Italian. She won the Mythopoeic Award for The Innamorati, a novel inspired by early Roman myth and the Italian "Commedia dell'Arte" tradition....
