After reading the O'Connor short story again, and doing the map drawing assignment, I have a lot of other thoughts that were brought up when one of my classmates asked for some feedback on their upcoming seminar for that exact reading.
The below is copied word-for-word from the email that I sent to said classmate:
"However, I am REALLY intrigued by this idea you have of "mapping murder" at the end of the story. It almost plays into the idea that while murders can be premeditated (planned out, like a map, thinking military almost), they are also crimes of passion or committed in desperation. But, it also calls to mind the spatial landmarks that O'Connor uses in the family's deaths to indicate where things are happening but also that some things are hidden - such as the actual deaths (aside from the grandmothers) that are 'off-page' so to speak. Plus all the events and choices in the way that led them to their eventual demise.
I also makes me think about how recreating crime scenes, or making a map of the scene and piecing together the events, is also a type of mental mapping for investigators. Perhaps that can be an alternate way for you to think of things and have a different take or edge to the idea of a mental map aiding in the analysis of a text. Like procedural crime shows, dramas, and mystery novels, isn't creating a map kind of like the procedures, specific steps used, in solving a crime? It can appear to be all very procedural in some cases.
Such as the case study reading, evaluating maps has steps, what is there, what isn't? Take the assignment: specific steps: read the short story then draw the map. What changes if the steps are out of order? What about drawing the map as the narrative unfolds, more procedure like: read, then draw, then read, then draw, step-by-step."
This thought process is still hanging out in the back of my mind, even weeks after the reading...
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