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November 24, 2009

O’Connor collection wins National Book Award vote

 In a special National Book Foundation online vote, author Flannery O’Connor edged out William Faulkner, Ralph Ellison, Thomas Pynchon and other leading writers. More than 10,000 people cast ballots in the first public vote in the history of the National Book Awards, honoring The Complete Stories by Flannery O’Connor as the “Best of National Book Award Fiction from 1950 to 2008.”

O’Connor earned the majority of the votes for her acclaimed short story collection, which won the 1972 National Book Award for Fiction. Other finalists in the online poll included “The Stories of John Cheever,” “William Faulkner’s Collected Stories,” “The Collected Stories of Eudora Welty,” Ralph Ellison’s “Invisible Man” and Thomas Pynchon’s “Gravity’s Rainbow.”

“That an O’Connor story would win a prize over a Faulkner story any day of the week would have been inconceivable during her lifetime,” observed O’Connor biographer Brad Gooch, author of the critically-acclaimed Flannery: A Life of Flannery O’Connor. “Certainly many writers have spotlights following them around while alive, but then interest suddenly vanishes when the Klieg lights of publicity are shut off. Like so much about O’Connor’s life and work, her reputation has developed in reverse.”

The Complete Stories by Flannery O’Connor was one of six titles in competition for the special prize, created to mark the 60th anniversary of the National Book Awards, which celebrate American literature. In July, the National Book Foundation -- the governing body that manages the awards — announced a campaign to select the best book from among the 77 winners in the fiction category since the inception of the awards in 1950.

“This remarkable honor from the National Book Foundation is yet more evidence of Flannery O’Connor’s still-growing importance in American culture,” said Bill Dawers, president of the Flannery O’Connor Childhood Home in Savannah, Ga. “Her stories — some now more than half a century old — are both immediate and vital even to young readers today. Even in an age when we are overwhelmed with information, O’Connor’s stories still have the ability to shock. But once the shock is over, readers find deeper rewards, and return to her writings again and again.”

Previous National Book Award winners, finalists, and judges trimmed the list of 77 winning books to six of their favorite titles and presented them for an unprecedented public vote online from September 21 through October 21.

“Flannery O’Connor is so relevant right now,” noted Craig Amason, executive director of the Flannery O’Connor - Andalusia Foundation. “She flies in the face of convention. Her work resonates now more than ever because younger readers are no longer turned off by the grotesque, the darkness, and the violence of O’Connor’s work.”

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