Greenleaf
Flannery O’Connor finished writing “Greenleaf” by the end of March 1956. It appeared as the second story in her second collection, Everything That Rises Must Converge, published posthumously in April 1965, a year after O’Connor’s death. Kenyon Review accepted the story for publication in its summer 1956 issue. According to biographer Brad Gooch, “the bull in the story was a composite of one down the road ‘that was always getting out and running his head through the fender of the [O’Connors’] truck’” at Andalusia (273). After the appearance of “Greenleaf” that summer, the story won a first prize O’Henry Award. Three large collections also published the story, including, First-Prize Stories, 1919-1957; Best American Short Stories of 1957; and First-Prize Stories, 1919-1963.
Initially, Mrs. May’s continual demonstration of her aversion toward Christianity allows readers to form an interpretation of the story that ultimately dismisses Christianity. When she discovers Mrs. Greenleaf on the ground in the trees, Mrs. May reflects that “she thought the word, Jesus, should be kept inside the church building like other words inside the bedroom. She was a good Christian woman with a large respect for religion, though she did not, of course, believe any of it was true” (“Greenleaf,” 316). The witnessing of Mrs. Greenleaf’s display of her religion makes Mrs. May feel “as furious and helpless as if she had been insulted by a child” (317), further demonstrating her rejection of Christianity. Scholar Margaret Earley Whitt shows that Mrs. May further “reduces religion” (124) when she views the church building as a place for her sons to “meet some nice girls” (“Greenleaf,” 320). As a result, Mrs. May rejects Christianity as a religion and the church as a place of worship. Mrs. May also dismisses religion when Mr. Greenleaf tells her that “‘I thank Gawd for ever-thang,’ Mr. Greenleaf had drawled. You might as well, she had thought in the fierce silence that followed; you’ve never done anything for yourself” (324). Mrs. May ultimately hides behind her pretext as a hardworking farm woman to reject Christianity, which she feels wastes time. Overall, O’Connor’s characterization of Mrs. May as against Christianity potentially permits readers to form an interpretation of the story that decentralizes the influence of Christianity in “Greenleaf.”
Building upon Mrs. May’s distaste for Christianity, O’Connor uses Mrs. May to satirize outward religious spectacle through Mrs. Greenleaf, deepening the story’s potential criticism of Christianity. O’Connor first characterizes Mrs. Greenleaf through Mrs. May’s hostile view:
Mrs. Greenleaf was large and loose. [...] Instead of making a garden or washing their clothes, her preoccupation was what she called ‘prayer healing.’ [...] She took [newspaper clippings] to the woods and dug a hole and buried them and then she fell on the ground over them and mumbled and groaned for an hour or so moving her huge arms back and forth under her and out again and finally just lying down flat and, Mrs. May suspected, going to sleep in the dirt. (316)
The spectacle Mrs. Greenleaf makes in the name of religion and faith disgusts Mrs. May, whose views on religion clearly contradict Mrs. Greenleaf’s. Whitt notes that, unlike Mrs. May, “Mrs. Greenleaf, with her backwoods fundamentalist perspective, values the mystery of Jesus as deity, accepting his power to right the wrongs of the day” (123). Mrs. May instead fixates on Mrs. Greenleaf placing greater importance on her faith than taking care of her household. As a result, Mrs. May determines Mrs. Greenleaf to be lazy, using her religion as justification for laziness, which deepens Mrs. May’s aversion toward religion and subsequently satirizes Mrs. Greenleaf’s spectacle. Therefore, through comparing Mrs. Greenleaf’s demonstration of Christianity to laziness, O’Connor satirizes religious ostentation as indicative of false or lazy piety.
Furthermore, O’Connor defines Christianity as an element of the culture of the U.S. South, which detracts from Christianity as a religion, thereby allowing for an interpretation of “Greenleaf” that dismisses the religion of Christianity. Scholar Rosemary M. Magee states that O’Connor described the U.S. South as possessing “the presence of a Biblical reality” (x), alluding to the social influence of Christianity beyond its role as a religion. Bryan Giemza elaborates upon the significance of Christianity to southern culture by explaining that O’Connor’s work provides a “critique of the version of Christianity that dominated the southern states” (130), who placed an “emphasis on biblical literacy” (181). O’Connor writes in “The Grotesque in Southern Fiction” that she thinks “it is safe to say that while the South is hardly Christ-centered, it is most certainly Christ-haunted. The Southerner, who isn’t convinced of it, is very much afraid that he may have been formed in the image and likeness of God. Ghosts can be very fierce and instructive” (Mystery and Manners, 44-45). As a result, O’Connor solidifies the ghost-like presence and influence of Christianity on southern culture as more than a religion, as an entity interwoven with the society of the U.S. South.
Mrs. May supports the idea of Christianity not as a religious practice but as part of southern culture when she tells her sons, “I don’t like to hear you boys make jokes about religion” (“Greenleaf,” 320), and when she reflects that, even though “she was a good Christian woman with a large respect for religion,” she did not “believe any of it was true” (316), which shows a respect for Christianity that stems not from a personal faith but from a recognition of the importance of Christianity to the society in which she lives. As Whitt explains, “Mrs. May understands the language of the Christian religion where it fits into society” (125). For instance, when Mrs. May finds Mrs. Greenleaf on the ground in the woods, Mrs. May says to Mrs. Greenleaf that “Jesus [...] would be ashamed of you” (“Greenleaf,” 317), thereby evoking Christianity as a societal construct to rebuke Mrs. Greenleaf for what Mrs. May feels is idiotic laziness, behavior that destabilizes the rules of appropriate conduct according to southern tradition. Therefore, O’Connor potentially uses Mrs. May’s views toward Christianity to define it as an element of social culture in the U.S. South more so than a religious system.
Alternatively, repeated imagery of death, which evokes thoughts of an afterlife and the fate of one’s eternal soul, allows for an interpretation of “Greenleaf” through the theological lens of Christianity as a religion. Mrs. May talks often about when she is “dead and gone” (315, 319), constantly thinking of the future of the farm she intends to leave for her sons. However, she seems more concerned with her legacy in the farm after she dies, afraid that her sons will ruin her legacy. For instance, “she had whispered, ‘I work and slave, I struggle and sweat to keep this place for them and as soon as I’m dead, they’ll marry trash and bring it in here and ruin everything’” (315). The fate of the farm consumes Mrs. May, who repeatedly mulls over what she will “put in her will” (317) regarding the farm for “when she [is] dead and gone from overwork and worry” (319). As a result, Mrs. May’s constant references to her death evoke thoughts of one’s legacy in death and the fate of one’s eternal soul, thus beginning a religious interpretation of “Greenleaf.” Mrs. May solidifies this possible interpretation when she tells Wesley that “‘when I die,’ she said in a thin voice, ‘I don’t know what’s going to become of you.’ ‘You’re always yapping about when-you-die,’ he growled as he rushed out, ‘but you look pretty healthy to me’” (321). Once alone, Mrs. May reflects that “‘they needn’t think I’m going to die any time soon,’ she muttered, and some more defiant voice in her added: I’ll die when I get good and ready” (321). Mrs. May’s repetitive chatter of dying as well as her arrogant confidence that she will have control over when she dies foreshadows her untimely death at the story’s end.
The foundation of Mrs. May’s aversion toward Christianity coupled with viewing the bull as a symbol for either Jesus or God affirms a theologically-based interpretation of “Greenleaf.” O.T. and E.T. Greenleaf’s bull, Mrs. May’s primary adversary, symbolizes the strength and power of Jesus and God. For example, the Israelites in the Old Testament acknowledge their reverence for God and awareness of his power by sacrificing bulls, or, more commonly, oxen, to him. In Numbers, the seer Balaam also compares God’s strength to that of an ox by saying that “the Lord their God is with [the Israelites], and the shout of a king is among them. God brings them out of Egypt and is for them like the horns of a wild ox” (Num. 23.21-22 ESV). Therefore, the bull, “like some patient god” (“Greenleaf,” 311), shows his power through his horns that ultimately kill Mrs. May. Her altercation with Mrs. Greenleaf in the woods likens the bull to Jesus. When Mrs. Greenleaf cries out, “‘Jesus! Jesus!” Mrs. May “stopped still, one hand lifted to her throat. The sound was so piercing that she felt as if some violent unleashed force had broken out of the ground and was charging toward her” (316), mirroring the story’s end where “the bull, his head lowered, was racing toward her,” preparing to “pierce her” (333). The reaction that Mrs. Greenleaf’s moaning of the name Jesus evokes in Mrs. May parallels the bull and Jesus by equating Jesus’s name with imagery of the charging bull. By symbolizing the bull as either Jesus or God, O’Connor’s staging of Mrs. May’s death by the bull further a Christian interpretation of the story.
Ultimately, the death of Mrs. May by the bull potentially represents the strength of God and the redemption of Jesus exercised on Mrs. May, which provides Mrs. May’s moment of grace that warns readers against rejecting Christianity. At the story’s conclusion, “one of the horns sank until it pierced [Mrs. May’s] heart and the other curved around her side and held her in an unbreakable grip” (333). Here, the bull symbolizes the power of God as it “pierces” Mrs. May and holds her with immense strength, thereby demonstrating the bull’s power over Mrs. May as reflective of God’s power over mortal souls. Literary critic Lorna Wiedmann adds that the story’s end also conveys the bull as Jesus when “the horn of salvation [pierces] her hard heart” (36). Once Mrs. May has been pierced, she “had the look of a person whose sight has been suddenly restored but who finds the light unbearable” (“Greenleaf,” 333). On numerous occasions, the Bible characterizes Jesus as light that restores sight to the spiritually blind. For instance, “Jesus spoke to the people once more and said, ‘I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life’” (John 8.12 NLT), thus metaphorically characterizing Jesus as a light. Later, Jesus offers that “I came into this world, that those who do not see may see” (John 9.39 ESV), referring to his power to give clarity and understanding to those who are spiritually blind. Mrs. May confirms that the bull as a symbol of Jesus erases her aversion toward religion and gives her understanding when she seems “to be bent over whispering some last discovery into the animal’s ear” (“Greenleaf,” 334). Weidmann therefore asserts that Mrs. May’s “‘discovery’ is grace” (36) to redeem herself of rejecting Christianity. Scholar Ralph C. Wood notes, as a result, that “to have been opened to such a saving truth, even in the violent stab of death, is a consummation ever so much better than to have lived a closed and contented life in damning self-ownership” (90). Critic Keith Perry points out that Proverbs 11:28, taken from the Douay Bible “edition O’Connor herself owned,” reads that “the just shall spring up as a green leaf” (57), which, by evoking imagery of the Greenleafs, signifies Mrs. May’s need to accept the religious “justness” of Mrs. Greenleaf in her moment of grace, the same piety Mrs. May detests. As a result, O’Connor’s establishment of Mrs. May’s moment of grace warns readers against the detriment of rejecting Christian theology.
Works Cited
ESV Study Bible: English Standard Version. Translated by Crossway, ESV text ed., Wheaton, Crossway Bibles, 2011.
Giemza, Bryan. Irish Catholic Writers and the Invention of the American South. Baton Rouge, Louisiana State UP, 2013.
Gooch, Brad. Flannery: A Life of Flannery O’Connor. New York, Little, Brown, 2009.
Holy Bible: New Living Translation. Translated by Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Tyndale House Publishers, 2015.
Magee, Rosemary M., editor. Conversations with Flannery O’Connor. Jackson, UP of Mississippi, 1987.
O’Connor, Flannery. “Greenleaf.” The Complete Stories, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1971, pp. 311-34.
---. Mystery and Manners: Occasional Prose. Edited by Sally Fitzgerald and Robert Fitzgerald, New York City, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1969.
Perry, Keith. “Straining the Soup Necessarily Thinner: Flannery O’Connor’s ‘Greenleaf’ and Proverbs 11:28.” English Language Notes, vol. 42, no. 2, Dec. 2004, pp. 56-59. MLA International Bibliography, https://doi.org/10.1215/00138282-42.2.56.
Whitt, Margaret Earley. Understanding Flannery O’Connor. Columbia, U of South Carolina P, 1997.
Wiedmann, Lorna. “Flannery O’Connor’s Six Protestant Conversion Tales.” Flannery O’Connor Review, vol. 12, 2014, pp. 33-53. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/26671270.
Wood, Ralph C. Flannery O’Connor and the Christ-Haunted South. Grand Rapids (Michigan), W.B. Eerdmans Publ., 2005.