http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2010/05/10/on-the-square-today-20/ A First Things Blog Fri, 24 May 2013 07:57:59 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2010/05/10/on-the-square-today-20/comment-page-1/#comment-13615 Joe Z Mon, 10 May 2010 18:31:45 +0000 http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/?p=15824#comment-13615 I’ve read more O’Connor than Percy, so take this with a grain of salt, but I don’t see why this is such cause for surprise. O’Connor has a more distinctive style and is less didactic. It pains me to say that Percy is didactic at all, but in his lesser works he is, at least a bit. In the Thanatos Syndrome, for example, the plot resolves only because the villains on the edge of world domination and psychic destruction of humanity happen to be sexual abusers of children who are as sloppy about concealing the evidence thereof as they are ruthless and brilliant in their overall plans – of course Percy was making a point, but as a plot device it’s a little too convenient and makes the point didactic. Is anything in O’Connor a convenient plot device? I’m hard pressed to think of an example. I would argue that her prose is simply of a higher quality as well, but others may think differently, I suppose.

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