Manners are of such great consequence to the novelist that any kind will do. Bad manners are better than no manners at all, and because we are losing our customary manners, we are probably overly conscious of them; this seems to be a condition that produces writers.

Workshop director Paul Engle was the first to read and comment on the initial drafts of what would become Wise Blood. O'Connor wrote: "Grace changes us and change is painful. She entered Georgia State College for Women (now Georgia College & State University) in an accelerated three-year program and graduated in June 1945 with a Social Sciences degree.

S. Mary Flannery O'Connor (March 25 1925 – August 3 1964) was an American writer and essayist. She was a Southern writer who often wrote in a Southern Gothic style and relied heavily on regional settings and grotesque characters.