UNIT 2—TWENTIETH-CENTURY SHORT STORIES

Frank O’Connor

➢ SELF-STUDY ACTIVITIES and RESEARCH

o In LION Database search in AUTHORS “Frank O’Connor” and read his

biography:

▪ What biographical facts can you see reflected in O’Connor’s

stories? (family, war)
▪ Why do you think his fiction was banned by the laws of the
Republic of Ireland?

o Read these fragments from the Reviews “Frank O’Connor: new perspectives”
(first fragment) / “The Best of Frank O’Connor” (second fragment) you can
find in LION, Criticism section.

The section entitled "The Stories: Themes and Techniques" contains seven strong
essays that range over the well-known O'Connor territory: his themes of loneliness,
freedom, and the parochial aspects of Irish life; his portrayal of children and priests;
and his trademark techniques of humour, wit, and the carefully modulated
narrative voice. But there are also essays on more surprising topics, such as the role of
women's voices in his stories. One of the essays in this section makes a strong case for
the darker side of O'Connor's 45 New Yorker stories, thereby refuting the public's
(fuzzy) impression of him as a comic writer of light, whimsical stories.
…………………………………………..
Joyce's reputation has risen in the Irish literary pantheon to such an unassailable
place that even your taxi driver in Dublin, who, like me, has probably never been able
to finish Ulysses, will still confidently tell you that this is the greatest Irish novel. And
yet-granted that Joyce's reputation rests on the novel while O'Connor's supreme
achievements are in the short story-the best Irish fiction writer of the last century was
arguably not Joyce at all, but Frank O'Connor.[…]
It is hard to convey through brief quotations the true flavour of O'Connor's fiction,
based as it is on an unequalled sense of pacing and spaciousness. One might sum
up the quality of his work in one word: "tenderness." Like Joyce, O'Connor found it
convenient to live most of his life outside Ireland, that island which contains, as
Yeats put it, "Great hatred, little room."

▪ Reflect on the aspects of loneliness and freedom in O’Connor’s

stories. Do you consider his use of humour significant?
▪ What are the differences between Joyce and O’Connor? What is the
point of their comparison in the fragment?
▪ What do you think the author means by an “unequalled sense of
pacing and spaciousness” in O’Connor’s stories?

o Read these sections from the INTERNET article “My Oedipus Complex by
Frank O’Connor” you can find in
http://www.encyclopedia.com/arts/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-
and-maps/my-oedipus-complex-frank-oconnor-1963
Following the publication of his first collection of stories in 1931, Frank
O'Connor became established in Ireland as a major writer of fiction […]
His best work is considered to be that which focuses on the mores of the
Catholic middle classes in the decades following independence, a time
he saw to be one of increasing social repression. His achievements were praised
by William Butler Yeats, who once commented that "O'Connor was doing for
Ireland what Chekhov did for Russia," an acknowledgement of his mastery of
the short story form as well as his commitment to broadly social themes.[…]
"My Oedipus Complex" has an unusual reputation in the O'Connor canon. It is
frequently included in collections and has achieved widespread recognition
outside Ireland, but it has been subject to some disparagement at
home.[...]

For some critics, however, there is a shallowness to "My Oedipus Complex." The
author is perceived to be indulging himself in personal reminiscences and
neglecting larger social issues. The story, it is pointed out, is just one of a
number from the 1950s that feature Larry Delaney and in which O'Connor seemed
to prefer dwelling on the personal. These stories are compared unfavorably
with "Uprooted," "The Luceys," "In the Train," and "The Mad Lomasneys," for
example, all of which are praised for their portrayal of provincial Irish life. In
contrast, there is nothing that can be identified as social or political about "My
Oedipus Complex," and there is little indeed to identify the milieu as specifically
Irish.[…]

As the critic Eavan Boland has indicated, the theme of "My Oedipus Complex" is
loss of innocence and the acquisition of cunning. Larry's childhood idyll,
typified by a purity of early mornings—"feeling myself rather like the sun, ready
to illumine and rejoice"—is gradually replaced by an adult sense of the need for
allegiances and strategies to fight a hostile world. One can even see in the boy
foreshadowings of the lonely characters O'Connor explored in other stories.
Moreover, the boy's growth in self-awareness is presented in a narrative that
does not slip into nostalgia but maintains a distance between the teller and the
tale.

▪ What are the critiques “at home” towards the story based on?
▪ Do you think we could apply the saying “the personal is
political” to O’Connor’s stories?
▪ Could there be any symbolic parallelism between the boy’s
“growth in self-awareness” and Ireland’s coming of age?
Self-Study Questions for Analysis of Short-Stories

FRANK O’CONNOR “My Oedipus Complex”

1. What War is the narrator referring to in this story? Why is Ireland involved
in this War? Date the War and describe Ireland’s political situation at that
period of history.

2. Analyze the narrative voice and the point of view. Who narrates the story?
Identify and study the way the figures of the Father and Mother appear for
the first time in the narration.

3. What is “the Oedipus complex”? Search on the web for Freud’s theory and
define it briefly. It is based on a triangle relationship. How is this portrayed
in the story?

4. Analyze the geographical location described in the story. Do we have

information about where they live? Analyze the way the home, the town,
and the “sense of place” is described throughout the narrative. Are they
important issues in the story?

5. Identify how masculinity and femininity constructions are portrayed in the

story by the father and mother’s actions, behaviours, expectations, etc., and
by the child’s impressions of them.

6. O’Connor’s story, broadcasted first in 1950 and then published in 1963, was
literarily criticized in Ireland for focusing on personal issues and for
avoiding wider political and social issues that affected the country. Eavan
Boland, on the other hand, praised the story because, according to her,
O’Connor exposed the way individuals must grow up searching for
“allegiances and strategies to fight a hostile world”. Can you see any way in
which this childhood story shows any Irish concerns at a social and cultural
level?

7. Do you think political matters can be exposed in intimate and personal

narratives? That is, can the personal be political?

8. Analyze the information we have in the story about Irish society: the kind of
neighbourhood, the economic and political situation, family models, etc.

9. O’Connor suggested that he wants to present “experiences that captivate the

‘listener’ of his short-stories”. In this and in the following story (“Guests of
the Nation”) the common element is that of creating intimacy between the
characters and the reader. Think and try to define how he manages this in
both stories. Take into account that he is a realist writer that focuses on the
“orality” of narration (more than symbolic or poetic); this may be the reason
why he considers the “reader” as “listener”.
FRANK O’CONNOR “Guests of the Nation”

1. Who is narrating the story? Whose point of view guides the narration?

2. Jot down a scheme of the different characters in the story.

3. What War is the story contextualized in? Date it and search for info of
Ireland’s political situation during this war.

4. Locate the story geographically, if possible following details given in the

narration.

5. Which role you think “dialogues” play in this story? How does the author
develop them? What characteristics—linguistically, stylistically—do the
different characters’ voices have?

6. What is the main and most important message O’Connor wants to transmit
in relation to Anglo-Irish relationships through the characters’ friendship?

7. Confidence, loyalty, obedience, honor, personal relationships vs. authority,

intimacy and law, individual and society, consciousness, ethics, etc… All
these are elements deeply represented in what seems to be a “light” comic
(till the end) short-story. Choose the ones that appealed to you most when
reading the story and briefly write why you think they are important. How
are they related to Irish history and culture?

8. This story was published in 1931, much earlier than “My Oedipus Complex”.
War, intimacy, and loss of Innocence seem to be the main common elements.
How differently does the author treat them in both?

9. Resolutions or endings are climactic narrative structural elements in short-

stories. Study and compare the events that function as “resolutions” in both
stories.

10. W.B. Yeats considered that Frank O’Connor “was doing for Ireland what
Chekhov did for Russia”. Why do you think he said that in relation to the
Irish literary tradition?