Mary Hood and the speed of grace: catching up with Flannery O'Connor

Studies in Short Fiction, Wntr, 1996 by Joy A. Farmer

Another story in which Hood's religious consciousness is apparent is "How Far She Went." This story bridges that 30-year gap between Hood and O'Connor, for it may best be understood in light of "The Artificial Nigger." First, the characters in the stories are similar: both depict a grandparent and a grandchild who share an abysmal relationship. Mr. Head and Nelson of "The Artificial Nigger" wrangle endlessly, each trying to outdo the other, even in life's most mundane matters. For example, since Nelson is "always irked when Mr. Head is the first up" (196), Mr. Head pointedly rises early enough to have breakfast cooking when Nelson awakes. Naturally, Mr. Head is equally irritated when Nelson beats him into the kitchen. They transform every other aspect of daily life into a similar contest: the number of times each has visited Atlanta has Mr. Head winning two to one if Nelson's being born there counts, which Mr. Head refuses to concede. When Nelson retorts, "I will've already been there twict and I ain't but ten" (196), Mr. Head observes that Nelson is "a child who was never satisfied until he had given an impudent answer" (196). Mr. Head fails to see that he is never satisfied unless he has done the same. His problem--and Nelson's--is colossal pride, which incessantly goads each to assert his superior wisdom and experience.

Like Mr. Head and Nelson, the unnamed woman and her granddaughter in "How Far She Went" also have a relationship characterized by bickering over trifles. The story opens:

They had quarreled all morning, squalled all summer about the

incidentals: how tight the girl's cut-off jeans were, the "Every Inch

a Woman" T-shirt, her choice of music and how loud she played it,

her practiced inattention, her sullen look. (67)

Their conflict likewise stems from pride--the grandmother's certainty that her sin of bearing an illegitimate child has made her the source of all moral truth, the granddaughter's just as prideful certainty that her grandmother is no authority: "[The girl] turned on her bare, haughty heel and set off high-shouldered into the heat. . . .`You don't know me!' [she] shouted, chin high" (68).

When the girl gets thus out of hand, the grandmother regains control by playing some withheld bit of information as a trump card. For instance, she saves the letter from the girl's father until mid-lunch; then, she breaks the news that he does not want his daughter back: "He's been planning it since he sent you here," she gloats (68). Mr. Head controls Nelson the same way. When the boy's insolence becomes untenable, Mr. Head uses knowledge to regain the advantage. Earlier Nelson has bragged about seeing plenty of blacks, so when the "coffee-colored man" (200) appears on the train, Mr. Head delights in exposing Nelson's ignorance. Furiously, Nelson accuses his grandfather of lying: "You said they were black. . . . You never said they were tan" (201). The girl's reaction to her grandmother's power play is also disbelief and anger: "You're lying. . . . I could turn this whole house over, dump it!" (68). Clearly Mr. Head and the grandmother are parents who provoke their children to wrath, just as Nelson and the granddaughter are children who do not honor their parents.