Freaks re-imagined: an analysis of disability in Carson McCullers and Flannery O'Connor

This thesis analyzes the representation of disability and the role of disabled characters in selected works by Carson McCullers and Flannery O’Connor, with the aim of investigating the role that narrative can have in overcoming stereotypes about disability and denouncing the treatment, policies, and difficulties disabled people face. The thesis is divided in two sections: the first one, made of the first three chapters, provides the theoretical framework informing the close reading of the texts comprising my corpus; the three chapters in the second part of my work are devoted to the analysis of the selected works. Specifically, in the first chapter there is an introduction to the idea of disability and the field of Disability Studies. In the second chapter, the application of Disability Studies to literature is explored, with a particular focus on the literature of the American South. The third chapter introduces the two authors and their works, thus creating a link with the second part of the thesis. The fourth chapter is devoted to the close reading of McCullers’ works The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter and The Ballad of the Sad Café; the fifth chapter delves into the study of O’Connor’s stories “The Life You Save May Be Your Own” and “Good Country People;” and the sixth chapter explores the figure of the protagonist in The Violent Bear It Away by O’Connor. The thesis will show how the two authors, by giving their disabled characters a more central position in the narration, were able to challenge the stereotypes usually attributed to disabled characters – and people with disabilities in real life – and to critique the system which oppressed disabled people.