High School Literary Criticism Papers

Valdosta State University instructors, VSU Archivist Deborah Davis, and Janice Daugharty collaborated with high school English teachers at Valdosta High School, Lowndes High School, Echols County High School, and Clinch County High School to instruct high school students for three days about engaging in the writing process, conducting  literary and historical research on primary sources, regional identity themes, Southern authors, the writer's role as an observer, and writing literary criticism.

Students were prepared for the project activities by reading a Janice Daugharty's short story "Shorn Glory" and by reviewing a CD handout created by the project developers containing primary and secondary sources and literary criticism related to Daugharty's short story. 

On day one of this project activity, Deborah Davis presented a tabletop exhibit and a multi-media show on Daugharty, and discussed the VSU archive collection of Janice Daugharty, and her writings including various drafts of her works. She also demonstrated how the archive collection can be used as a primary resource in studying a piece of literature.

On day two instructors, Daugharty, and students, discussed Daugharty's short stories, the writing process, and sense of place as it related the stories.      

On day three instructors taught students about how to use historical and literary research; and instructed students about how to incorporate what they learned about sense of place into their critical essays.

As part of this project activity, approximately 100 high school juniors and seniors submitted literary criticism papers for evaluation and nine were chosen for this journal. The nine students whose essays were chosen presented their papers at the Janice Daugharty Festival, a regional writing conference, held on April 29, 2004. The conference was an additional event emerging from the project.

Southern “Religion”

by Rebekah Staten

Across the globe, on this vast planet we call Earth, there are literally hundreds of religions. Beliefs in Allah, Yahweh, God, and other deities lie scattered throughout the land. In America alone, the religions vary from Islam to Mysticism. Down in the South, the main religion is Christianity. Authors from the South only reinforce this assertion with their literature. Southern writers convey their beliefs in Christ through many outlets. This may be achieved either directly or through the use of symbols. Which ever way the authors choose to display these beliefs, it is safe to say that this region is characterized by possessing a very unique sense of God. The southern part of the United States has a very theological way of thinking, especially when it comes to thoughts of man and his image (“Some Aspects of the Grotesque in Southern Fiction” 44). Southern literature exemplifies a society which clings to the thought of God instead of discovering God for themselves.

One Southern author who weaves the religion of the South into her works is Janice Daugharty. Janice Daugharty is able to entangle religion into her stories so well because she “writes where she knows” (“Write Where You Know” 32). She has written novels such as Dark of the Moon, Necessary Lies, and Pawpaw Patch and many short stories like “Looking to Miss Sarah,” “You’re No Angel Yourself,” “Dogs in a Pack,” and “Nightshade” where this revealing of religion is true. In her short story “Shorn Glory,” which is a part of a collection consisting of 14 short stories in a book entitled Going Through the Change, the true beliefs of a small group of Southerners are revealed. “Shorn Glory” is a short story about a man named Clifford who, while drunkenly peddling his bicycle, meets triplet girls whose parents are gone to town. As the story progresses, Clifford talks to the girls and tries to find out more about them. He proceeds to offer to cut the girls’ hair for them. The girls do not seem to accept this offer, but Gloriann talks the other two girls into agreeing. Gloriann’s leadership is displayed in her ability to answer for all three triplets and her unfailing manner of decision making for the girls. Clifford cuts the girls’ hair and seems to change for the better as the story draws to a close. Instead of leaving as a staggering, drunken fool, he leaves the girls sober and heading east, while the shadows under the chinaberry tree were lessening (“Shorn Glory” 131). Throughout the story the characters are used by Janice Daugharty to display the raw meat that Southern religion is made of in the South.

In Southern society, religion dictates a way of life. Most Southerners are in Sunday school at 10:00 A.M., in the church service at 11:00 A.M., and heading for the house by 12:00 P.M. Daugharty is accurate in the picture she paints of the South. “Shore as Sunday rolled around, Ma’d light out for church, dragging me by the hand…Church of God they called it” (“Shorn Glory” 126). Clifford, in talking to the girls, shows how his mom was devoted to her God. It is apparent through the references of Sunday school and the phrase “the Bible says it,” which is used at least three times in the story, that Clifford and the girls have been brought up in a good “Christian” home. The image of God, or at least the memory of God, haunts the Southern way of living. “It is safe to say that while the South is hardly Christ-centered, it is most certainly Christ-haunted” (“Some Aspects of the Grotesque in Southern Fiction” 44). Even today, it seems as though people try to live the “good” life, when in reality all they are doing is going through a ritual. There are countless people who wear long skirts to their ankles and hair down to their knees just because their mother would not let them wear a knee high skirt and short hair as a child. It seems as though religion in the South has become a force of habit. Southerners are unaware that you cannot “ride into heaven on your mama’s coattails.” The triplets have their mother’s religion, and they cannot seem to get past it. It is the mother who believes that the girls’ hair is their glorious crown (“Shorn Glory” 126). A ball and chain has been woven into their silvery locks, and the girls are imprisoned by the weight of their mother’s convictions. She, not the girls, is the one who would be upset by the girls cutting their hair. You have to find God for yourself, even if that means going against the beliefs your mama raised you on. The girls in “Shorn Glory” seem to be ignorant of this fact.

There is a huge similarity found in the South and in Southern literature. It is the idea that Southerners are “religious.” They have a way of being good on Sunday, and then doing whatever they want to do during the rest of the week. Clifford was a religious man, or at least he thought of himself as one. He went to Sunday school as a child and knew a few Bible stories and scripture verses, like “First Corinthians, something”(“Shorn Glory” 131). However, he did not know God for himself… just yet. He knew the God that his mom knew. In order for a person to be truly religious, they have to have a personal knowledge of the God they serve. Clifford went to church as a child, yet in the story the whole reason he meets the girls is because he is drunk. If he was a truly religious person, then he would know that the bible warns against the drunkard. Gloriann knew what the bible said, and explained to him that he did not need to drink so much (“Shorn Glory” 129). It was probably her mother who instilled that conviction upon Gloriann’s heart.

As seen in Southern literature created by authors such as Janice Daugharty, the South has a hard time letting go of traditional beliefs concerning religion in order to embrace individual beliefs. Stories such as “Shorn Glory” help readers to better understand the lack of individual beliefs and the resulting form of “brainwashing” that ensues. Southerners have a tendency to follow a system of beliefs that is used by someone else, usually a parent, instead of searching it out for themselves. “I ain’t one to bicker over religion” (“Shorn Glory” 126). Janice Daugharty sums up Southern religion in that one sentence. She knows that Southerners do not want to fight over whether they are going to the Methodist Church this Sunday, or if they are going to the Church of God. It seems to be easier to accept one big universal relationship than the thought of individual, one-on-one relationships. A personal God seems to be out of reach. Flannery O’Connor was correct when she said that “ghosts can be very fierce and instructive. They cast strange shadows, particularly in our literature” (“Some Aspects of the Grotesque in Southern Fiction” 45). The figurative ghost of Christ seems to walk up and down the streets and sidewalks of every Southern city. Southerners allow other peoples’ “religious ghosts” to cover up the thought of Christ. Sometimes these “ghosts” can be incredibly strong and dangerous, especially if we do not understand their entire strength. The South will be rid of these “ghosts” when they choose to search out God for themselves and not to accept what their Church of God mother believes. In today’s South we are children who are reaching for a vanishing memory, straining for naught. Until every Southerner undergoes the transformation to spiritual adulthood, the South will remain as described in its literature, incomplete and grasping for something that just is not there.

WORKS CITED

Daugharty, Janice. “Shorn Glory.” Going Through the Change. Princeton: Ontario Press,

1994,123-131

Daugharty, Janice. “Write Where You Know.” Writer’s Digest, 77, 5, May 1997, p. 32. Galileo

O’Connor, Flannery. “Some Aspects of the Grotesque in Southern Fiction.” Mystery and

Manners. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux. 1962.