In this fourth session of the Catholic influence on American Literature, we consider the contributions of devoutly Catholic American authors. Looking at a number of the more well known figures like Flannery O'Connor and Walker Percy, we then consider others like Walter Miller jr, John Kennedy Toole, and Andre Dubus.
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Catholic Literature of the USA
The Catholic Influence on American Literature
Session 4, Profoundly Catholic American Authors
Don’t read good books, or else you won’t have time for the great books! (Fr Raymond Nyquist)
I. Course Outline
May 19th - Introduction, and the Importance of Great Literature
May 26th - Catholic Themes in Non-Catholic American authors: Henry James and Willa Cather
June 2nd - Popular Lapsed-Catholic American Authors: Ernest Hemingway, F Scott Fitzgerald, and Cormac McCarthy
June 9th - Profoundly Catholic American Authors: Flannery O’Connor, Walker Percy, Walter Miller jr, “Michael Kent”
June 16th - Spiritual Writers of the USA: Archbishop Fulton Sheen, Thomas Merton, Dorothy Day, Walter Ciszek
II. Some recommendations for the order of reading Flannery O’Connor’s short storied
First set of stories:
A Good Man is Hard to Find, The River, A Temple of the Holy Ghost, Good Country People, A View of the Woods, The Enduring Chill, Revelation, Parker’s Back
Second set of stories:
A Late Encounter with the Enemy, The Life You Save May Be Your Own, The Artificial Nigger, You Can’t Be Poorer Than Dead, Everything that Rises Must Converge, Why Do the Heathen Rage?
Third set of stories:
Wildcat, The Turkey, Enoch and the Gorilla, The Displaced Person, The Comforts of Home, Judgement Day
Then, the remainder of the stories. Furthermore, the two novels could be read between each of the story sets.
Note that her novel Wise Blood uses (with some interesting changes) four of her short stories as chapters: The Train, The Peeler, The Heart of the Park, Enoch and the Gorilla.
Her novel The Violent Bear It Away makes use of the short story You Can’t Be Poorer Than Dead.
Finally, the story Why Do the Heathen Rage? was set to be developed into a full novel of the same name, but Flannery was too sick to complete this before her death.
III. A couple lesser known American Catholic authors
Walter Miller Jr - A Canticle for Leibowitz is certainly his most famous work. Others include Saint Leibowitz and the Wild Horse Woman which is a sequel published posthumously, and also collections of his short stories.
Walter M. Miller Jr.'s A Canticle for Leibowitz (published in 1959) is a post-apocalyptic novel that follows a Catholic monastic order dedicated to preserving fragments of human knowledge after a devastating global catastrophe. Set across about 18 centuries, the story explores how civilization slowly rebuilds itself from the ruins of technological collapse. The monks of the Order of Leibowitz labor to safeguard books, documents, and memories of the past, viewing this work not only as intellectual preservation but also as a sacred religious duty. There are three major sections, each set approximately 600 years apart. The later parts refer to characters from the earlier portions.
Catholic themes permeate the novel, shaping both its worldview and its central questions. The book reflects on the relationship between faith and reason, the endurance of religious tradition through historical upheaval, and the moral responsibilities that accompany human knowledge. Drawing on Catholic concepts such as sainthood, vocation, sin, redemption, and the continuity of the Church, Miller presents history as a recurring cycle in which spiritual truths remain relevant even as societies rise, fall, and change. The result is a thoughtful meditation on humanity's capacity for both destruction and hope, viewed through a distinctly Catholic lens.
This was the only novel completed by Walter Miller jr before his death (by suicide in 1996), and it won the “Hugo Award for Best Novel” in 1961 and is frequently listed as one of the greatest sci-fi novels of American literature. Following this major success, Walter Miller jr was a recluse for 30+ years.
“Michael Kent” is the pseudonym for Beatrice Bradshaw Brown, author of The Mass of Brother Michel.
The Mass of Brother Michel is a historical Catholic novel by “Michael Kent” set in sixteenth-century France during the religious turmoil of the Reformation. The story follows a young nobleman whose ambitions, relationships, and spiritual struggles gradually draw him into a deeper confrontation with questions of faith, sacrifice, and vocation. A horrible accident strips him of all his hopes, and ultimately leads to a reflection on religious life and true happiness. Against a backdrop of social conflict and religious violence, the novel explores the tension between worldly desires and the call of God, presenting a richly Catholic vision of human life and redemption. At its heart is the mystery of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which serves not merely as a religious practice but as the spiritual center around which the characters' choices, conversions, and destinies revolve. Themes of prayer, repentance, suffering, grace, and the transformative power of the sacraments are woven throughout the narrative, making it both an engaging historical drama and a profound meditation on Catholic belief. An excellent book for young men!
John Kennedy Toole
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole is a comic novel set in New Orleans that follows the misadventures of Ignatius J. Reilly, an eccentric, highly educated, and deeply opinionated man who finds himself increasingly at odds with the modern world. Through a colorful cast of characters and a series of absurd situations, the novel satirizes contemporary culture, social institutions, and human pretensions. Ignatius's worldview is heavily shaped by medieval philosophy and theology, and he frequently judges the world around him according to ideals he believes modern society has abandoned.
Although the novel is primarily a work of comedy rather than explicitly religious fiction, Catholic themes run beneath much of its humor. Ignatius is fascinated by medieval Christendom and often invokes concepts drawn from thinkers such as Boethius and Thomas Aquinas, especially ideas about order, virtue, providence, and the instability of worldly fortune. The book uses these themes satirically, contrasting lofty spiritual and philosophical ideals with the flawed, often ridiculous behavior of ordinary people. At the same time, it offers a distinctly Catholic sense of human weakness: nearly every character is marked by some combination of pride, folly, self-deception, or misplaced desire, making the novel both a farce and a reflection on the comic imperfections of fallen human nature.
A Confederacy of Dunces owes its publication largely to the efforts of Walker Percy. After author John Kennedy Toole died (by suicide in 1969), his mother tirelessly sought a publisher for the unpublished manuscript and eventually persuaded Percy to read it. Initially skeptical, Percy was astonished by its originality and humor and used his influence to help secure its publication in 1980. The novel was met with widespread acclaim and went on to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1981. Today it is regarded as one of the great American comic novels and a landmark work of Southern literature. From Jonathan Swift, “When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him.”
Andre Dubus (short stories). Be careful not to mix him up with his son who is a fairly well known novelist, Andre Dubus III.
The short stories of Andre Dubus are renowned for their compassionate portrayal of ordinary people confronting difficult moral choices, fractured relationships, and the consequences of their actions. His characters often struggle with marriage, divorce, infidelity, parenthood, loneliness, and violence, yet Dubus approaches them with profound sympathy rather than judgment. A devout Catholic, he infused his fiction with themes of sin, grace, forgiveness, sacrifice, and redemption. While his stories rarely preach or offer easy resolutions, they consistently explore the tension between human weakness and the possibility of spiritual renewal, reflecting a deeply Catholic understanding of both the dignity and brokenness of the human person.
Heavily influenced by the writing style of Ernest Hemingway, Andre Dubus is widely regarded as one of the greatest American short-story writers of the late twentieth century. His collections, including Adultery and Other Choices, Finding a Girl in America, and Dancing After Hours, earned critical acclaim for their emotional depth and moral seriousness. During his career he received numerous honors, including a MacArthur Fellowship, two Guggenheim Fellowship awards, and the Rea Award for the Short Story for lifetime achievement. Though he never achieved the popular fame of some contemporaries, his work remains highly influential and is often cited as a model of literary fiction that takes both faith and human experience seriously. His most famous short stories are: Killings, A Father’s Story, The Pretty Girl, Adultery, and The Winter Father.
Others:
Alice McDermott - Her fiction is deeply shaped by her Catholic faith, exploring themes of grace, sacrifice, suffering, and redemption in the ordinary lives of her characters. Rather than presenting overt religious instruction, her novels reveal the sacred dimensions of everyday experience through careful attention to family, memory, and human relationships. Works such as Charming Billy and The Ninth Hour reflect a distinctly Catholic imagination that seeks signs of God's presence amid life's joys and sorrows.
Ron Hansen - His fiction is marked by rich historical detail, moral complexity, and a deep engagement with spiritual questions, reflecting his lifelong Catholic faith. In novels such as Mariette in Ecstasy and Exiles, he explores themes of grace, redemption, suffering, and the mystery of divine action in human lives. Exiles is about Fr Gerard Manley Hopkins.
Mary Karr - Her writing combines sharp wit, emotional honesty, and lyrical prose, often drawing on her experiences of addiction, recovery, and spiritual searching. Her memoirs, especially Lit, reflect the profound influence of her conversion to Catholicism and explore themes of grace, forgiveness, and faith amid life's struggles. Another novel, which was a New York Times bestseller, is The Liar’s Club.
IV. Walker Percy (1916-1990)
Walker Percy was one of the most important American Catholic writers of the twentieth century. Born into a prominent Southern family, he trained as a physician but abandoned medicine after contracting tuberculosis, a lengthy illness that led him to a deep study of philosophy, literature, and religion. Influenced by existentialist thinkers as well as the Catholic intellectual tradition, Percy converted to Catholicism in 1947 and spent much of his literary career exploring the spiritual disorientation of modern life. His fiction and essays examine questions of identity, alienation, belief, and the search for meaning in a secular age, making him a central figure in modern Catholic literature.
Percy's best-known novel, The Moviegoer, won the National Book Award for Fiction and remains a classic of American literature. Other major novels include The Last Gentleman, Love in the Ruins, Lancelot, and The Thanatos Syndrome. Throughout these works, his Catholic faith is evident not through overt preaching but through a sustained concern with grace, free will, moral responsibility, and humanity's longing for transcendence. Percy believed that modern people often suffer from a spiritual homelessness that neither technology nor material success can cure, and his novels portray the search for truth and redemption in a world marked by confusion and doubt.
Walker Percy's writing style combines philosophical depth with wit, irony, and an accessible narrative voice. His novels often feature intelligent but spiritually restless protagonists whose observations of everyday life reveal deeper questions about identity, meaning, and belief. Drawing on existential philosophy, Southern literary traditions, and Catholic thought, Percy blends serious intellectual inquiry with humor, satire, and memorable dialogue. Despite tackling complex themes, his prose is generally clear and conversational, allowing readers to engage naturally with profound questions about alienation, grace, and the human search for transcendence in the modern world.
From Love in the Ruins:
Father Smith looks at his watch as usual and as usual says: “Time to get locked in the box. Coming?”
“Very well.”
Blinking with surprise, he lest out a groan and looks at his watch again. Must he hear my confession in the few minutes he allots to polishing off the week’s sins of his practicing Catholics? Well, he will if he must.
“Don’t worry, Father. It won’t take a minute.”
He nods, relieved. Perhaps I've been slipping off to confession elsewhere.
My turn comes at last. I kneel in the sour darkness of the box. Which smells of sweat and pullman curtain.
The little door slides back. There is Father Smith, close as close, cheek propped on three fingers, trying to keep awake. [...]
“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,” I say and fall silent, forgetting everything.
“When was your last confession?” asks the priest patiently.
“Eleven years ago.”
Another groan escapes the priest. Again he peers at his watch. Must he listen to an eleven-year catalogue of dreary fornications and such? Well, he’ll do it.
“Father, I can make my confession in one sentence.”
“Good,” says the priest, cheering up.
“I do not recall the number of occasions, Father, but I accuse myself of drunkenness, lusts, envies, fornication, delight in the misfortunes of others, and loving myself better than God and other men.”
“I see,” says the priest, who surprises me by not looking surprised. Perhaps he’s just sleepy. “Do you have contrition and a firm purpose of amendment?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know? You don’t feel sorry for your sins?”
“I don’t feel much of anything.”
“Let me understand you.”
“All right.”
“You have not lost your faith?”
“No.”
“You believe in the Catholic faith as the church proposes it?”
“Yes.”
“And you believe that your sins will be forgiven here and now if you confess them, are sorry for them, and resolve to sin no more?”
“Yes.”
“Yet you say you do not feel sorry.”
“That is correct.”
“You are aware of your sins, you confess them, but you are not sorry for them?”
“That is correct.”
“Why?”
“I couldn’t say.”
“Pity.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You are?”
“Yes.”
“For what?”
“For not being sorry.”
The priest sighs. “Will you pray that God will give you a true knowledge of your sins and a true contrition?”
“Yes, I’ll do that.”
“You are a doctor and it is your business to help people, not harm them.”
“That is true.”
“You are also a husband and father and it is your duty to love and cherish your family.”
“Yes, but that does not prevent me from desiring other women, and even contriving plans to commit fornication and adultery.”
“Yes,” says the priest absently. “That’s that nature of the beast.”
Damn, why doesn’t he wake up and pay attention?
“But you haven’t recently?” says the priest.
“Haven’t what?”
“Actually committed adultery and fornication?”
“No,” I say irritably, “But–”
“Hm. You know, Tom, maybe it’s not so much a question at our age of committing in the imagination these horrendous sins of the flesh as of worrying whether one still can. In the firetower on such occasions I find it useful to imagine the brushfires as the outer circle of hell, not too hot really, where these sad sins are punished, and my toes roasting in the flames. Along comes Our Lady who spies me and says: ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, you here? This is ridiculous.’”
Dame, where does he come off patronizing me with his stock priestly tricks – I can tell they’re his usual tricks because he reels ‘em off without even listening. I can smell the seminary and whole libraries of books “for the layman” with little priest-jokes. How can he lump the two of us together, him a gray ghost of a cleric and me the spirit of the musical-erotic?
More tricks:
“For your drinking you might find it helpful, at least it is in my case, to cast your lot with other drunks. Then, knowing how much trouble you’re going to put your friends to if you take a drink, you’re less apt to – though it doesn’t always work.”
“Thank you,” I say coldly.
“Now let’s see.” He’s nodding again, drifting off to smoke and brushfires, “Very well. You’re sorry for your sins.”
“No.”
“That’s too bad. Ah me. Well–” He steals a glance at his watch. “In any case, continue to pray for knowledge of your sins. God is good. He will give you what you ask. Ask for sorrow. Pray for me.”
“All right.”
“Meanwhile, forgive me but there are other things we must think about: like doing our jobs, you being a better doctor, I being a better priest, showing a bit of ordinary kindness to people, particularly our own families – unkindness to those close to us is such a pitiful thing – doing what we can for our poor unhappy country – things which, please forgive me, sometimes seem more important than dwelling on a few middle-aged daydreams.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry,” I say instantly, scalded.
“You’re sorry for your sins?”
“Yes. Ashamed rather.”
“That will do. Now say the act of contrition and for your penance I’m going to give you this.”
Through the little window he hands me two articles, an envelope containing ashes and a sackcloth, which is a kind of sleeveless sweater made of black burlap. John XXIV recently revived public penance, a practice of the early Church.
While he absolves me, I say an act of contrition and pull the sackcloth over my sports coat.
“Go in peace. I’ll offer my mass for you tonight.”
“Thank you,” I say, dumping the ashes in my hair.
V. Flannery O’Connor
“To the hard of hearing you shout, and for the almost-blind you draw large and startling figures.”
“The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.”
“Everywhere I go I'm asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion is that they don't stifle enough of them. There's many a best-seller that could have been prevented by a good teacher.”
“I write to discover what I know.”
“I don't deserve any credit for turning the other cheek as my tongue is always in it.”
“Art never responds to the wish to make it democratic; it is not for everybody; it is only for those who are willing to undergo the effort needed to understand it.”
“Writing a novel is a terrible experience, during which the hair often falls out and the teeth decay. I'm always irritated by people who imply that writing fiction is an escape from reality. It is a plunge into reality and it's very shocking to the system.”
“All human nature vigorously resists grace because grace changes us and the change is painful.”
“People without hope not only don't write novels, but what is more to the point, they don't read them.”
“There is something in us, as storytellers and as listeners to stories, that demands the redemptive act, that demands that what falls at least be offered the chance to be restored. The reader of today looks for this motion, and rightly so, but what he has forgotten is the cost of it. His sense of evil is diluted or lacking altogether, and so he has forgotten the price of restoration. When he reads a novel, he wants either his sense tormented or his spirits raised. He wants to be transported, instantly, either to mock damnation or a mock innocence.”
“I think it is safe to say that while the South is hardly Christ-centered, it is most certainly Christ-haunted.”
“A story is a way to say something that can’t be said any other way, and it takes every word in the story to say what the meaning is.”
“I think there is no suffering greater than what is caused by the doubts of those who want to believe. I know what torment this is, but I can only see it, in myself anyway, as the process by which faith is deepened. A faith that just accepts is a child's faith and all right for children, but eventually you have to grow religiously as every other way, though some never do.
What people don't realize is how much religion costs. They think faith is a big electric blanket, when of course it is the cross. It is much harder to believe than not to believe. If you feel you can't believe, you must at least do this: keep an open mind. Keep it open toward faith, keep wanting it, keep asking for it, and leave the rest to God.”
“All my stories are about the action of grace on a character who is not very willing to support it, but most people think of these stories as hard, hopeless and brutal.”
VII. American Catholic Poets
A. Joyce Kilmer (widely recognized as one of the greats). One of the most beloved American poets of the early twentieth century, remembered especially for the lyrical simplicity and enduring popularity of his poem Trees. After his conversion to Catholicism, his faith became a central influence on his writing, inspiring poetry that celebrated the presence of God in nature, the beauty of creation, and the spiritual meaning found in everyday life.
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As Winds That Blow Against A Star Now by what whim of wanton chance But rays from Heaven, white and whole, The darts of toil and sorrow, sent |
Trees I think that I shall never see A poem lovely as a tree. A tree whose hungry mouth is prest Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast; A tree that looks at God all day, And lifts her leafy arms to pray; A tree that may in Summer wear A nest of robins in her hair; Upon whose bosom snow has lain; Who intimately lives with rain. Poems are made by fools like me, But only God can make a tree. |
B. Thomas Merton: The somewhat controversial American Trappist Monk. His most famous poems are probably In Silence, Song for Nobody, The Virgin Mary Compared to a Window, Audabe-Harlem.
C. Jessica Powers (Sr Miriam of the Holy Spirit). Widely regarded as one of the finest Catholic poets of the twentieth century, combining technical excellence with profound spiritual insight. Her deeply Catholic faith, shaped by her vocation as a Carmelite nun, inspired poetry that explores prayer, contemplation, divine love, and the soul's longing for union with God with both intellectual depth and lyrical beauty. Some famous poems are: In Mary-Darkness, The Mercy of God, Enclosure, and To Live with the Spirit.
D. Dana Gioia is one of the most distinguished contemporary American poets, celebrated for combining formal craftsmanship, accessibility, and profound reflection in works that have earned honors including the American Book Award and the Laetare Medal. A committed Catholic, Gioia has often said that Catholicism shapes his worldview and therefore informs his poetry, which frequently explores themes of mystery, mortality, grace, beauty, and the presence of the transcendent in ordinary life.
E. Paul Mariani is one of the leading Catholic poets and literary biographers of modern America, acclaimed for both his original poetry and his award-winning biographies of writers such as Gerard Manley Hopkins, Hart Crane, and William Carlos Williams. His Catholic faith permeates his work, which explores grace, memory, sacramental vision, and the presence of God in ordinary life; over his distinguished career he has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, multiple fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities, as well as the John Ciardi Award for Lifetime Achievement in Poetry and the inaugural Flannery O'Connor Lifetime Achievement Award.
F. Franz Wright was a celebrated American poet whose work is renowned for its emotional intensity, spiritual searching, and striking lyrical clarity. After embracing Catholicism later in life, his poetry became increasingly shaped by themes of grace, repentance, suffering, mercy, and divine love; his collection Walking to Martha's Vineyard won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, cementing his reputation as one of the most important religious voices in contemporary American poetry.
G. Allen Tate was a major figure in twentieth-century American literature, known for his influential poetry, literary criticism, and leadership among the Southern Agrarians. After converting to Catholicism in 1950, his faith increasingly informed his work, deepening his exploration of history, tradition, moral order, and the spiritual crisis of the modern world; his distinguished career earned him numerous honors, including service as the first Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress and the National Medal for Literature.