Flannery O'Connor in Rome

The Pontifical University of the Holy Cross will host a convegno this April on the life and works of American writer Flannery O'Connor. The working title for the event is: "Reason, Fiction and Faith: An International Flannery O'Connor Conference".

Here are some highlights:

The international conference, Reason, Fiction and Faith, to be held in Rome, 20-22 April 2009, forms part of the biennial "Poetics and Christianity Project" series at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross.

The Conference will provide an occasion for scholars, academics and artists to reflect not only on Flannery O'Connor and her work but also on the issues that both raise, such as

• violence and the grotesque,
• the artistic use of humor,
• moral vision in narrative art,
• the relationship of reason to art and faith, and
• the various ways that Christian faith illuminates and is reflected in literature, music, film, sculpture and painting.

The rich combination of keen intelligence, literary art and Christian faith was central to the work of American short-story writer and novelist Flannery O'Connor (1925-1964).

Her stories and novels reveal a penetrating grasp of the human condition, an uncompromising moral vision, and craftsmanship of the highest order. Her posthumously-published letters, The Habit of Being, reveal a life that - in the face of sickness, suffering and death - was lived with both a deep, sophisticated faith and a remarkable grace. And in her essays, Mystery and Manners, O'Connor is a "hilly-billy Thomist" with a keen critical mind and a fresh, coherent vision of her vocation as an artist and a Christian.

A Roman Catholic woman writing in and about the Protestant American South, she managed to balance a rational, unsentimental approach to art and faith with a respectful appreciation of the mystery at the heart of each, in a way that offers a model for what can be accomplished when reason, artistry and faith come together in a single writer.

The goal of this international conference on Reason, Fiction and Faith is to analyze and appreciate this remarkable convergence and the art that it can produce.

Those interested in attending or to read about more about the conference can click here.