It seems that in “The Lame Shall Enter First” and “A View of the Woods” Flannery O’Connor sends a very clear message that relates to the American Dream. In each story, the main character has a very clear goal that they are pursuing earnestly. Fortune wishes to mold his granddaughter in his own image and get her to denounce and betray her father and her family name. Sheppard believes he can “save” Johnson and (in a way) his son. In each case, the character obsesses over their goal, eventually taking extreme measures when things start to not go their way. Clearly however, neither achieve their goal, and instead their efforts result in unspeakable tragedy. It seems O’Connor is sending a cautionary message about obsessively pursuing one’s ambitions, especially when they are unrealistic (in this case because they involve not material things but changing the minds of people). This sends a message we have seen before– one coming from Fitzgerald through The Great Gatsby. Both Fitzgerald and O’Connor seem to be cautioning against pursuing something that cannot be guaranteed: the ability of one’s mind to change.
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Kevin, I absolutely agree with your point that lying beneath O’Connor’s works is a warning against “obsessively pursuing one’s ambitions.” However, I think there is more to be extracted from her stories. In both, I think, O’Connor speaks of the proclivity of human beings to tend toward altruism, and the ease with which this feeling of selfless tenderness can lead to a distorted sense of goodness about oneself and one’s endeavors. Often with altruistic motives comes a false hope to improve the human condition –– which is just as much spiritual as it is physical –– through material and mechanical means. In “The Lame Shall Enter First,” Sheppard believes that Johnson’s evil is circumstantial and that with adequate care and encouragement –– and some artificial sense of belonging by means of a new, modified shoe –– Johnson will see his potential and rise to meet it. Similarly, in “A View of the Woods,” Mr. Fortune believes that his decision to sell his land for the sake of progress is, in some way, “securing the future”; he believes he is doing something inherently good, to the benefit of society (and particularly, his granddaughter, Mary). In both of these scenarios, though, the motives of O’Connor’s protagonists are short-sighted and disingenuous as they are truly rooted in a feeling of self-pride and a desire to “feed [their] visions of [themselves]” (290).