Southern Literature: Gritty, Gothic, and Grotesque

American literature, like most aspects of America, is a melting pot of cultural influences. But what happens when you take a bit of that melting pot and let it stew by itself, absorbing all of the local flavors? (Other than an elaborate cooking metaphor?) You get Southern literature—a delicious, mysterious, confusing gumbo of symbolism, heightened reality, and social critique.

Most explorations of American literature focus on writers from the Northeast—and why not? Our colonial roots tie us there, and even after we travel west with Mark Twain and James Fenimore Cooper, we inevitably make our Kerouacian circle back to New York City. But if you want truly American literature, you need to travel south where authors like Flannery O'Connor, Walker Percy, William Faulkner, Eudora Welty, and Truman Capote developed a style that was grounded in realism, but bloomed into the supernatural.

Southern stories don't even necessarily happen south of the Mason-Dixon line. Not every southern story has to have social commentary on the Reconstruction Era South. Southern literature is not about the setting, time period, or social conventions, but rather its style and themes.

Gritty Realism and Social Commentary

Before Southern literature can transcend the physical, in true Gothic fashion, it needs to be rooted in reality. The characters of Southern literature are rarely noble; they're ordinary, flawed people. For example, the grandmother in "A Good Man is Hard to Find," is not an exemplary figure for the majority of the short story. She is contentious, controlling, and judgmental. There is nothing extremely heroic or villainous about her behavior; she is flawed like all of us. 

Because the characters are realistic, it invites empathy from the reader. We can see ourselves in the grandmother—our own petty arguments and manipulative behavior. Because the majority of the story is realistic, the social commentary of the stories carries weight because we see it as a realistic look at the world.

In addition, because the characters are realistic, we are able to understand the thought process behind characters that we would initially dismiss with revulsion. In Eudora Welty's "Where is the Voice Coming From?" the narrator of the story murders a civil rights leader. Welty builds up to this horrific event with an interior monologue of the murderer's anger and rage. The frustration, envy, and hatred that the narrator feels is not exclusive to murderers. We can feel the twisted logic the man uses murder to assert control when he feels powerless. Because of this intense description of the man's feelings, Welty can shift the focus from the obvious evil (killing someone) to the trickier discussion of hate and blame.

Gothic and Supernatural Settings

While the supernatural is not always incorporated into Southern literature, it is a defining characteristic of the genre. Characters often struggle with issues of morality—whether Binx's morose musings in Percy's The Moviegoer, or literally any character writer by Flannery O'Connor.

Other texts deal more directly with the supernatural, from Joel's ghostly visions in Capote's Other Voices, Other Rooms, or the apocalyptic scene at the end of O'Connor's "Revelation."

When teaching these texts, it's important that students don't become fixated on the literal meaning of these incidents. Whether or not Mrs. Turpin literally saw the Great Judgment is not the point of the narrative—it is the social commentary on hypocrisy. 

Grotesque and Symbolic Characters 

Southern literature can get disturbing. Case in point: In Cold Blood describes the nonfiction story of brutal murder of a family as a result of Capote's detailed interviews with the murderers. Not convinced? "Good Country People" includes a character who is a Bible salesperson who steals prosthetic appendages from his clients.

Characters often have physical deformities that reflect a symbolic, internal issue. Characters are lame, mute, ugly, or dirty—symbols of interior struggles with being entrapped, communication, or self-worth. Though these are often signals of internal issues, beware the beautiful characters as well because while we all have internal problems, the people who look like they have it all together are the ones who are truly deceitful. 

The richness of the setting and characters does not make them easy to unravel, but that is what is so delightful about Southern literature. Each re-reading provides new insight and deeper understanding of incredibly complex people and situations. It is a genre that is rewarding, because amid all the fantastic and almost absurd situations is a core truth about humanity and our tangled, confusing lives.

Lesson Planet Resources:

Flannery O'Connor, Truman Capote, Eudora Welty, William Faulkner