Flannery O'Connor Institute
Flannery O'Connor Institute for the Humanities April Newsletter
Directors Note
We couldn't be happier with the way our celebrations for Flannery O'Connor's Centennial turned out! Thanks everyone who attended the events in Milledgeville. Spanning five days, we celebrated in style. Highlights included the unique art opening of never-before-seen visual art by Flannery O'Connor, a guest lecture on the art by Bob Donahoo, musical performances by Sally Jaye, Sean Mullins, and Colin Cutler, and a screening of Ethan Hawke's film Wildcat, including a discussion with two of the film's producers. Check out our photo gallery below. We were also so pleased with the media coverage of the event, and all the public interest in Flannery O'Connor. We thank The New Yorker, the New York Times, the Atlantic Journal-Constitution, No Depression Magazine, Garden and Gun Magazine, GPB, Fox 5 Atlanta, The Baldwin Bulletin, and WMAZ Macon for coming to town and taking the time to think about Flannery's legacy with us. We also appreciate all the meaningful support from GCSU President Cathy Cox, Interim Provost Holley Roberts, and Interim Associate Provost Mandy Jarriel. This truly was a group effort, and we enjoyed collaborating with MANY different units across campus to bring a once-in-a-century experience to life. Thanks to all who contributed!
Dr. Katie Simon
Interim Executive Director of the Flannery O'Connor Institute for the Humanities
Many thanks to the Mary Flannery O'Connor Charitable Trust for funding these travel scholars!
- Amy Alznauer, author of The Strange Birds of Flannery O’Connor
- Matt Bryant Cheney, President of the Flannery O’Connor Society and co-editor of the forthcoming Reckoning with Racism and Flannery O’Connor
- David Griffith, author of A Good War Is Hard to Find: The Art of Violence in America
- John Han, author of forthcoming Flannery O’Connor’s Georgia: Photos and Notes
- Susan Ketchin, author of The Christ-Haunted Landscape: Faith and Doubt in Southern Fiction
- Daniel Moran, author of Creating Flannery O’Connor
- Alessandro Matone, University of Notre Dame graduate student and 2023 winner of the Sarah Gordon Award from the Flannery O’Connor Review
Visiting scholars at the art opening
Pictured left to right: Caterina, Lily, & Alessandro Matone, Amy Alznauer, Matt Bryant Cheney, Daniel Moran, Dave Griffith
Visiting scholar John Han
Posing as the evangelist Bevel Summers from "The River" at the Oconee River Greenway
Bob Donahoo on stage
Delivering his lecture "O'Connor's Other Art" to a packed room
Book club is today!
April Book Club
Join us as we discuss O'Connor's essay "Some Aspects of the Grotesque in Southern Fiction.”
(2 p.m. in person in Eatonton, Georgia at the Writer’s Museum; on Zoom at 7 p.m.)
Thursday, Apr 17, 2025, 02:00 PM
Sylvia’s Coffee, South Jefferson Avenue, Eatonton, GA, USA
Book club virtual option
To join us for the online book club at 7:00 p.m. via Zoom, please register online.
Missed our events in 2024? Find them online!
Check out our YouTube channel for recordings of our virtual events.
Congratulations to our 2025 Laidlaw Fellow, Jack Love!
The Flannery O’Connor Institute for the Humanities announces that it will award the 2025 Laidlaw Fellowship to Jack Love of Texas A&M University. Love is a PhD student in the Department of English where he studies late 19th and 20th century American Literature with an interest in ecocriticism and the American South. His dissertation looks at the dynamic exchange between water and agricultural spaces in American Southern fiction and narrative. Flannery O'Connor is one of Love's primary authors of study. He has presented work and chaired panels on O'Connor at South Central MLA. He has also published work on Flannery O'Connor in Christianity & Literature and the Journal of the Georgia Philological Association. Additionally, Jack participated in the NEH Summer Institute "Reconsidering Flannery O'Connor" at GCSU in 2023 where he first had the opportunity to visit Andalusia and Milledgeville. He says of the award, “The Laidlaw Fellowship is such a wonderful opportunity for me to return to Milledgeville for the second time so that I can continue to study the fiction of Flannery O'Connor. My time at GCSU and Andalusia will be an incredibly enriching experience that will significantly impact the work I produce for my dissertation. I am very grateful for this opportunity, and I'm excited to visit Flannery O'Connor's hometown once again!”
Order The Flannery O'Connor Review
Copies can be purchased by mailing a check or money order for $15 made out to "Flannery O'Connor Review" to:
Bruce Gentry, Editor
Flannery O'Connor Review
English Dept., Campus Box 44
Georgia College
410 W. Greene St.
Milledgeville, GA 31061