Parker's Back
| "Parker's Back" | |
|---|---|
| Short story by Flannery O'Connor | |
A Byzantine Christ Pantocrator with expressive eyes — Church of Dormition in Daphni, Greece. | |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Southern Gothic |
| Publication | |
| Published in | Everything That Rises Must Converge |
| Publication type | single author anthology |
| Publication date | 1965 |
"Parker's Back" is a short story by Flannery O'Connor. It was initially published in 1965 in O'Connor's posthumous short story collection Everything That Rises Must Converge. It tells the story of Parker, a worldly and disordered man who rejects Christianity and aimlessly drifts through life until supernatural phenomena begin appearing to him one day. Parker remains in denial about his growing spirituality until the end of the story, when he finally accepts his Christian nature. Ironically, it is his fundamentalist Christian wife who has the most trouble accepting the change.
André Bleikasten, a scholar of Southern American literature, said "'Parker's Back' belongs with O'Connor's most explicitly religious stories" and is “one of her most enigmatic and gripping texts”.