Flannery O'Connor and Robert Giroux

"Patrick Samway, S.J., locates Flannery O'Connor in a new country—not in the South of her red clay roads and not in the realm of the Christian sacred but in the literary marketplace of writers, editors, and publishers. His work shows how O'Connor did not leave publication matters to accident or to the angels; rather, she collaborated happily with editor Robert Giroux to bring her writing into print. The book vividly and meticulously chronicles as never before the sheer busyness with which O'Connor pursued the business of publication." —Gary Ciuba, author of Desire, Violence, and Divinity in Modern Southern Fiction: Katherine Anne Porter, Flannery O'Connor, Cormac McCarthy, Walker Percy

"This is a masterful account of the literary and personal relationship between O’Connor the brilliant writer and Giroux the editor par excellence. Using a wide range of sources, Patrick Samway, S.J., situates both O’Connor and Giroux within a broad context of biographical, historical, cultural, and literary influences and traces their mutual development and growing friendship as it developed into an intimate editor/author partnership. Samway’s own skills as an editor—his impressive command of details, his judicious insights and judgments, his sensitivity to the challenges both figures faced in their careers—helps create a nuanced narrative of two of the brightest literary presences of the twentieth century." —John F. Desmond, author of Risen Sons: Flannery O’Connor’s Vision of History

“When everything was coming together for the young, Southern, Catholic fiction writer Flannery O’Connor, it all began to fall apart. That’s the critical insight readers will glean from Jesuit priest Patrick Samway’s thoughtful, smartly written literary study Flannery O’Connor and Robert Giroux: A Publishing Partnership.” —Today’s American Catholic

"Samway is fastidious in this glimpse into the working relationship between author Flannery O’Connor and editor Robert Giroux. . . . The respective biographies are seamlessly welded together. . . . Samway weaves an insightful account of how an uncommonly discerning editor helped guide a distinctive authorial voice to new literary heights." —Publishers Weekly

“Patrick Samway’s new book consists of three subjects: the long and deepening relationship between Flannery O’Connor and her editor, Robert Giroux; some reflections on the theological implications of O’Connor’s fiction; and finally, an overview of the Catholic artists and intellectuals who composed a circle around her. It is, considering the literary estates that granted permissions, an impressively authorized book, and it participates in a long line of criticism that claims O’Connor as a primarily Catholic writer.” —Flannery O’Connor Review

“Well-researched and rich in biographical detail, Flannery O'Connor and Robert Giroux: A Publishing Partnership is a wonderful account of the special literary and personal relationship that the two shared, and is certain to be enjoyed by fans of O’Connor and students of Southern literature alike.” —The Literary South

"Fr. Samway's book is a fascinating study of their professional and working relationship that goes beyond the immediate subject to include O'Connor's friendships with many other writers of the period." —Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture

"You don't have to have read deeply in O'Connor's oeuvre to enjoy Samway's part-biography, part-memoir, part-literary analysis. It is full of interesting tidbits." —National Catholic Reporter

“In this new and perceptive study, Patrick Samway, S.J., details Giroux’s “publishing partnership” with Flannery O’Connor, one that has a special poignancy because of their shared Catholic faith and the limited time they had together. . . . Samway is a valuable guide to O’Connor’s theological influences, particularly the Jesuits William Lynch and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.” —America Magazine,

“While Samway’s book will introduce many readers to Giroux, it also introduces them to a new side of Flannery— not Flannery the literary genius, incisive essayist, or witty letter-writer, but Flannery the harried author. We’re drawn into her navigation of a world of travel, contracts, typos, blurbs, reviews, translations— and her human side is thrown into relief.” —Word on Fire

“Samway offers a close-up history of how this highly original writer’s fiction was discovered, published and promoted.” —The Washington Post

“It is a nuanced account of two important figures in the world of American publishing that considers history, culture, and religion.” —Xavier Review