Exciting News and A Literary Controversy: Flannery O'Connor Gets Her Own Postage Stamp!

Image from US Postal Service

I was excited to read the news that Mary Flannery O'Connor, one of my top three favorite short story writers, is getting her own postage stamp. According to a report in Crux, the 93-cent stamp will be released on June 5.

Also according to Crux, the image is based on a black and white photo of O'Connor taken in 1945 when she was a student at Georgia State College for Women. The background image is peacock feathers, a signature symbol of O'Connor and representative of the birds raised on her home in Georgia.

The image the artist used of O'Connor has already created controversy.

According to an article in Entertainment Weekly, another favorite short story writer, Joyce Carol Oates, tweeted earlier this week that she doesn't think the stamp resembles any photos she has ever seen of O'Connor and wonders if the artist who created the stamp had ever seen an image of O'Connor or read any of the iconic writer's work. 

While I agree with Oates that the image doesn't resemble any I've seen of Flannery -- most photos I've seen show her wearing dark glasses -- I think the image is flattering.

And I will be in line next month to buy my O'Connor stamps.

I'm Back with a Quick Deadline Call for Submissions for Veterans and their Families

If you've been wondering where I've been for the past two months, I'm still around, although I haven't been spending a lot of time on social media this winter.

Earlier this year, after scrubbing my kitchen and bathroom floors, I was so out of breath I had to sit down and rest. Around the same time, my Internet service provider "upgraded" their system and threw my program speed and capability for a loop.

Frustrated with not being able to easily do what I used to do both physically and on line, I took some action.

I joined a local fitness center and began a nutrition and exercise program, and my husband figured out what was wrong with my laptop.

Now that I have more energy and my computer is behaving itself, I hope to blog more often.

I wanted to begin with this call for submissions because it's for such a good cause and there is no fee to enter.

Here are some details:

For all military personnel, Veterans, and their families:
Call for Submissions for Proud to Be: Writing by American Warriors volume 4
Deadline: June 1, 2015
No fee
Prize: $250
Categories: Short fiction, Poetry, Interview with a Warrior, Essay, Photography
Writing must be by veterans, military-service personnel or their families.  Include the connection in your short bio.

You can find more information by clicking on this link from Walrus Publishing.