Revelation by Flannery O’Connor

Revelation by Falnnery O’Connor published in 1964, the same year O’Connor died, explores societal hierarchy of the time period and what it would take for someone to become self aware of their judgmental thought process that made them hypocritical in the way they live their life.  This exploration mainly pertains to the 1960’s hierarchy a lot of people thought was how everything just ‘worked’, but especially the ‘good christian women’ who thought they were the ones setting the example.  It brought up a questioning of self awareness to the way people are living, and I say that in present tense to highlight the fact that it is still highly relevant today.

The story begins with Mrs. Turpin and her experience in a Doctor’s office because Mr. Turpin was thought to have had an ulcer.  There is a lot of symbolism with her being in a doctor’s office, where people get helped and healed, or atleast the beginning process of it begins.  Then on top of the setting, is the people.  There are about six other characters made relevant to the story, each of a different ‘class’as Mrs. Turpin noticed.  One was white trash, then middle class, then upper middle class.  There was a girl about the age of 18 reading a book about self help of some sort, and she was described to be a very ugly pitiful girl.  Through this girl Mrs. Turpin finally comes to the conclusion that she is wrong in her line of thinking about who is ‘in charge’ of others.  This girl is the standing figure of the ugly truth.  The girl, Mary Grace, is shown to be quite knowledgable as she is reading and attending college. She also is forceful and her eyes are described to be “lit all of a sudden with a peculiar light, an unnatural light
like night road signs give”.  Which is also an indication that she is a driving force of directon that Mrs. Turpin needs to listen to.   Mary Grace attacks Mrs. Turpin by biting and telling her she is a hog.  Hogs, well specifically wart hogs, is symbolism of vigilence and awareness.  These virtues are exactly what Mrs. Turpin needs more of, and in the end she recieves it through them.

By the end of the story, Mrs. Turpin has had a revelation to her life and how she was wrong.  She has a vision from God, and in that vision she saw all of the people she previously thought of as below her all walking up to Heaven.  They were dancing and singing while she and others alike her were all walking behind them.  She realized in this vision that they are equal to her, and she has nothing ‘over’ them.  God thinks equally of them and her and everyone.  She proceedas to walk back toward her house while thinking of what she saw.

I enjoyed this story for the complexity of it, you could either read it and go ‘what the heck’ or you could look deeper and see all of the layers put into the characters and ther growth and progression of each of them.  Now, i wish we could see more od Mrs. Turpin after her revelation to see what it is exactly that she changes, but overall it is a well written story i would recommend.

 

 

Author: Marley Roberson

When days leave you they roll off in a way hard to catch, hard not to let them drawl away. I find myself wondering if i have ever lived without that static in the background of my mind where memory lapse has no time scale or visual screen. So, to combat the delusion that my memory has no eyes, i write. I write more or less to prove to myself that my mind can speak, my memory can video tape, and my hands have more purpose than just picking things up that I never hold too long.