User:Rebbing/Notes/Flannery O'Connor

When was Miss O'Connor told of her lupus diagnosis?
From one biography: "Surprisingly enough, Regina O'Connor kept the diagnosis a secret from O'Connor until Christmas 1952. While O'Connor was visiting the Fitzgeralds for the holidays, Sally [Fitzgerald] broke the news of the diagnosis to O'Connor, knowing she was going against Regina's wishes. Never one to be less than fully attentive to the world around her, O'Connor revealed that she had suspected lupus all along and thanked Fitzgerald for her honesty."

What an eye-catching quote! I did not at first question the story, as it appeared truthful to me, and the book is published by a legitimate, if scholastic, publishing house. But, while looking for something else in The Habit of Being, a published collection of Miss O'Connor's letters, I came across a letter from the summer of 1952: "Regina [Miss O'Connor's mother] says Dr. Merrill diagnosed it as lupus before he even saw me. Over the phone. " If Miss O'Connor wrote Mrs. Fitzgerald in the summer of 1952 that her mother had told her about her diagnosis, Mrs. Fitzgerald could not have revealed that "secret" to her in Christmas of 1952.

When was Miss O'Connor diagnosed with lupus?
I found this proclaimation in a respectable-sounding paper: "With grim and certain diagnosis in July of 1952, Atlanta specialist Arthur J. Merrill informed Flannery O'Connor that lupus, and not rheumatoid arthritis, as concluded earlier by a physician in O'Connor's hometown, engendered her hip pain and other symptoms of internal distress."

The paper cites to (styled as Bluebook): 38–39 (S. Fitzgerald ed., Vintage-Random House (New York) 1980). I don't have access to that edition, but I thoroughly scoured my edition, and the closest thing I could find was the letter quoted in above. I can't rule out the narrative from Metaphor, but, as it appears to be questionably sourced, I can't in good faith use it.