An Introduction to Southern Gothic Literature

1. An Introduction to Southern Gothic Literature A Literary Subgenre

2. Do Now • Examine the painting on the next slide (Grant Wood’s “American Gothic”), and respond in your journal. • How does this painting reflect a particular place and time? • What possible symbolism is present in the painting? • Do you think this is a serious depiction or a satirical depiction of this father and daughter?

3. American Gothic Reflective of a place and time? Symbolism? Serious or satirical?

4. American Gothic • Wood's inspiration came from what is now known as the American Gothic House, and a decision to paint the house along with "the kind of people I fancied should live in that house." • The painting shows a farmer standing beside his spinster daughter. • The woman is dressed in a colonial print apron evoking 19th-century Americana, and the couple are in the traditional roles of men and women, the man's pitchfork symbolizing hard labor, and the flowers over the woman's right shoulder suggesting domesticity.

5. Two Interpretations • Art critics who had favorable opinions about the painting assumed the painting was meant to be a satire of rural small-town life. It was thus seen as part of the trend toward increasingly critical depictions of rural America. • Yet another interpretation sees it as an "old-fashioned mourning portrait...Tellingly, the curtains hanging in the windows of the house, both upstairs and down, are pulled closed in the middle of the day, a mourning custom in Victorian America. The woman wears a black dress beneath her apron, and glances away as if holding back tears.

6. The Painting’s Legacy • However, with the onset of the Great Depression, the painting came to be seen as a depiction of steadfast American pioneer spirit. Wood assisted this transition by renouncing his Bohemian youth in Paris and grouping himself with populist Midwestern painters, such as John Steuart Curry and Thomas Hart Benton, who revolted against the dominance of East Coast art circles. Wood was quoted in this period as stating, "All the good ideas I've ever had came to me while I was milking a cow."

7. Southern Gothic • A subgenre of the American Gothic novel genre • Like its parent genre, it relies on supernatural, ironic, or unusual events to guide the plot. • Unlike its predecessor, it uses these tools not for the sake of suspense, but to explore social issues and reveal the cultural character of the American South.

8. Southern Gothic • Southern writers usually avoid perpetuating antebellum stereotypes • The contented slave • The Southern belle • The chivalrous gentleman • The righteous Christian preacher • Instead, they use classic archetypes but portray them in a more modern manner • Damsel in distress • Knight in shining armor

9. Southern Gothic • Notable feature: “The Grotesque” • Depicts cringe-inducing scenes (like the bigoted dialogue of Flannery O’Connor’s characters or the repeated mutilation of Addie’s corpse) • Even though these elements are gross, the characters are sympathetic enough for the reader to remain interested

10. Famous Writers of the Genre • Harper Lee • William Faulkner • Flannery O’Connor • Eudora Welty • Cormac McCarthy • Tenessee Williams • Truman Capote

11. Southern Gothic’s Reception • “Anything that comes out of the South is going to be called grotesque by the northern reader, unless it is grotesque, in which case it is going to be called realistic.“ - Flannery O’Connor