The overwhelming theme that O’Connor develops within the assigned stories of this collection is the ultimate hindrance between man and salvation (God), pride. This seemingly plays into another common theme of freedom. Characters throughout this collection seem to struggle within themselves; some with good intentions and many with severe ignorance to their own hypocrisy. Starting with “Everything that Rises Must Converge”, we see Julian and the struggle with his mother. She is a devout racist, but not in a violent way. She is patronizing and feels superior. Julian, a new generation, who rejects his mother’s old southern virtues struggles to put his convictions into action. He condemns his mother and her pride, but fails to see his own as he
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Next, in “The Enduring Chill”, Asbury is a failing artist with a strong conviction for his “god”, art. He feels he has failed art, and therefore believes his ailments are punishment. He is prideful because he wants and seemingly needs his death to be a tragic loss of a young artist. He chooses not to accept grace and true salvation, because he feels “the artist prays by creating.” In the end, once he realizes his fate is suffering, he equates this to his rejection of God’s grace and his pride of an artist got in the way. “Parker’s Back”, “Revelation”, and “Judgment Day” are all very similar in the sense that they focus on grace and an acceptance of God. In “Parker’s Back”, O.E. struggles with acceptance of grace and giving up his secular ways. His wife, Sara Ruth, wounds him and calls him an idolator for his tattoo of Christ, yet she is the true idolator for marking him and thinking of herself as gracious and saintly. Her intentions were merely sinful and arrogant. O.E. has to learn, through struggles, to give up self-interests and come to grace. In “Revelation”, Mrs. Turpin struggles fiercely with pride. She is on the outside seemingly religious for her profession to be a Christian, but she does not truly meet grace until in the hospital with her husband where Mary Grace knocks her off her pedestal to find true
Next, in “The Enduring Chill”, Asbury is a failing artist with a strong conviction for his “god”, art. He feels he has failed art, and therefore believes his ailments are punishment. He is prideful because he wants and seemingly needs his death to be a tragic loss of a young artist. He chooses not to accept grace and true salvation, because he feels “the artist prays by creating.” In the end, once he realizes his fate is suffering, he equates this to his rejection of God’s grace and his pride of an artist got in the way. “Parker’s Back”, “Revelation”, and “Judgment Day” are all very similar in the sense that they focus on grace and an acceptance of God. In “Parker’s Back”, O.E. struggles with acceptance of grace and giving up his secular ways. His wife, Sara Ruth, wounds him and calls him an idolator for his tattoo of Christ, yet she is the true idolator for marking him and thinking of herself as gracious and saintly. Her intentions were merely sinful and arrogant. O.E. has to learn, through struggles, to give up self-interests and come to grace. In “Revelation”, Mrs. Turpin struggles fiercely with pride. She is on the outside seemingly religious for her profession to be a Christian, but she does not truly meet grace until in the hospital with her husband where Mary Grace knocks her off her pedestal to find true