Mrs. Turpin, the protagonist in Flannery O’Connor’s short story "Revelation," could be said to represent humanity. Neither entirely good—she is racist and judgmental—nor evil (she wants more than anything to be judged a good Christian woman), Mrs. Turpin is the conundrum that permeates much of O’Connor’s work.

Entering the doctor’s office with her clearly put-upon husband, Claud, Mrs. Turpin immediately sizes up the other individuals present. She instantaneously judges the other people in the waiting room, commenting to herself about the flaws she views, such as the acne-ridden skin of a young woman and the “white trash” characteristics of others. In assessing these people, she invariably compares herself and concludes that she is a superior human being, as, when judging the good with bad skin, O’Connor writes, “Mrs. Turpin herself was fat but she had always had good skin, and, though she was forty-seven years old, there was not a wrinkle in her face except around her eyes from laughing too much.”

O’Connor emphasizes the extent to which her protagonist judges others, including their shoes (“the white-trashy mother had on what appeared to be bedroom slippers, black straw with gold braid threaded through them—exactly what you would have expected her to have on”). The theme of judgement runs throughout “Revelation.” As noted, however, Mrs. Turpin is not without commendable qualities, although whether her self-assessment with respect to her life’s philosophy of helping those in need “whether they were white or black, trash or decent” needs to be viewed through a certain prism of perpetual self-righteousness. These glimmers of decency inevitably lead back to the judgmental nature that defines her. In a particularly telling comment, Mrs. Turpin thinks to herself upon hearing the poor white trash woman complaining that her family will only consume Coke and candy:

“That's all you try to get down em, Mrs. Turpin said to herself. Too lazy to light the fire. There was nothing you could tell her about people like them that she didn't know already. And it was not just that they didn't have anything.”

When Mary Grace physically assaults her, it constitutes the revelatory moment that forces Mrs. Turpin to reassess her station in life. Throughout the story, Mrs. Turpin reflects on Jesus and how she will measure up when her time comes. Mary Grace’s assault and words force the judgmental middle-aged woman to contemplate the nature of faith and her expectations of the gates of Heaven.

How did O’Connor feel about Mrs. Turpin? As suggested above, one could conclude that Mrs. Turpin represented much of humanity, with her tendencies towards a feeling of superiority and her rush to judge others. O’Connor’s stories are known for their cynical attitude towards self-righteous Christians. The author’s own fealty to the Catholic Church colored her perspective of those who pretended to an unwarranted sense of superiority. She did not like those who judged others while preaching the Gospel.

Despite Mrs. Turpin’s flaws, however, it is difficult to believe that her creator, O’Connor, sought to summarily dismiss her. The point of “Revelation” is the sudden awareness of one’s shortcomings or misjudgments with respect to Judgment Day. O’Connor gifts her protagonist the opportunity to reflect and improve before her day comes. This suggests a certain sympathy for her flawed character.

What is the message of Flannery O'Connor's "Revelation," and what is revealed to Mrs. Turpin?

Like many of Flannery O’Connor’s stories, “Revelation” can be read as an extended fictional sermon on the sin of pride.  Throughout the story, various characters – but especially Mrs. Turpin – reveal their pride and self-centeredness in various ways. It is because O’Connor takes us inside the head and thoughts of Mrs. Turpin that she seems the character most plagued by pride.  When she is attacked by Mary Grace, she begins to undergo the slow, painful process of being humbled, of being brought low, so that ironically she may one day be worthy in God’s sight.

Near the very end of the story, Mrs. Turpin receives a full-blown spiritual revelation that is one of the most explicit religious moments in all of O’Connor’s fiction.  Staring off into the evening sky, Mrs. Turpin sees (or at least imagines that she sees, although O’Connor does not appear to regard the vision as a figment of the imagination) a “vast horde of souls . . . rumbling toward heaven.” At the front of the line are many of the kinds of people whom Mrs. Turpin has spent much of the story condemning, including “white trash” and blacks. O’Connor then continues:

And bringing up the end of the procession was a tribe of people whom she recognized at once as those who, like herself and Claud, had always had a little of everything and the God-given wit to use it right. . . . Yet she could see by their shocked and altered faces that even their virtues were being burned away.

That last phrase – “even their virtues were being burned away” – is perhaps one of the most memorable and profound phrases O’Connor ever created.  In O’Connor’s eyes, human beings, infected with pride from birth, actually have little to be proud of when viewed as fallen, sinful creatures.  Even our virtues are not entirely worthy of God.  They are worthy of him only to the extent that they reflect back to him his own goodness. No one enters heaven (O’Connor believed) because of personal worthiness or personal virtue, but only through God’s grace and through God’s direct intervention (through the crucifixion) in human history.

O’Connor spends most of “Revelation” mocking Mrs. Turpin’s pride and pretensions, but as the story ends, she reveals that even pride in virtue (or perhaps especially pride in virtue) needs to be undercut and transformed into true humility.