Episode 33: Pulling Out the Mote in Flannery O'Connor's WISE BLOOD

About this episode

The episode discusses Flannery O'Connor's debut novel, Wise Blood, and its bizarre narrative elements.

Send us Fan Mail More celebrated for her dark, satirical short stories, Flannery O'Connor nevertheless burst on the literary scene in 1952 in her mid-twenties with her debut novel, Wise Blood. The story of a would-be preacher resistant to God's grace, the plot features some of the most bizarre and twisted left turns in American literature: self-blindings with lye, underaged ingenues named Sabbath, stolen mummies and gorilla suits, and enough vehicular homicides and car wreckage to make one re...

People in this episode

Hosts: Scott Yarbrough, Kirk Curnutt

Topics covered

• Flannery O'Connor
• Wise Blood
• American literature
• satirical stories
• preacher
• God's grace

Keywords

• Flannery O'Connor
• Wise Blood
• literary analysis
• satire
• American literature
• preacher
• bizarre stories

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: Wise Blood

More episodes of Great American Novel

• Episode 40: Can All the King's Men Put Us Back Together Again? · May 29, 2026 · 1h 23m
• Ep 39: Going Berserk in the American Pastoral · May 13, 2026 · 1h 18m
• Ep. 38: Now for Something Completely Different: the Great American Short Story Cycle · April 18, 2026 · 1h 57m
• EP 37: Engaging the Existential in Walker Percy's THE MOVIEGOER · December 26, 2025 · 1h 24m
• Episode 36: Burning Down the Days with THE FLAMETHROWERS by Rachel Kushner · November 4, 2025 · 1h 17m
• Episode 35: Escaping War for Love in Ernest Hemingway's A FAREWELL TO ARMS · August 10, 2025 · 1h 25m