Well, well. Very interesting. Betty Hester is, I believe, the correspondent known as "A," who appears in the Sally & Robert Fitzgerald edited collection of letters, "The Habit of Being."
A. went off the rails eventually; I believe she was manic-depressive. Sally Fitzgerald told me years ago that A. lived in a house full of cats and corresponded with a few authors whom she adored (I subsequently met another of these authors, who told me she eventually had to end the relationship because it got too weird).
I'll be interested to see the letters, but some really revelatory ones are already available at Georgia College. They give a sobering view of the Civil Rights Movement as it looked to O'Connor in the early '60s. Thank God her stories transcended the smaller-mindedness of her personal beliefs, or I'd find it hard to revere her as I do.
Well, well. Very interesting. Betty Hester is, I believe, the correspondent known as "A," who appears in the Sally & Robert Fitzgerald edited collection of letters, "The Habit of Being."
ReplyDeleteA. went off the rails eventually; I believe she was manic-depressive. Sally Fitzgerald told me years ago that A. lived in a house full of cats and corresponded with a few authors whom she adored (I subsequently met another of these authors, who told me she eventually had to end the relationship because it got too weird).
I'll be interested to see the letters, but some really revelatory ones are already available at Georgia College. They give a sobering view of the Civil Rights Movement as it looked to O'Connor in the early '60s. Thank God her stories transcended the smaller-mindedness of her personal beliefs, or I'd find it hard to revere her as I do.