Literary on A Good Man is Hard to Find by Flannery O'Connor - Research Paper Example

?Client’s 8 May A good man is hard to find is a very inspiring story which teaches the readers more things than one, the story presents the Southern milieu very vividly. The idiosyncrasies of the characters have also been given prime importance by the writer. This paper will comprehensively analyze the story. There are several people who exist only for themselves, their selfish existence is of no use to other people and this is one story which explores the selfish existence of the grandmother and how she tries her best to deceive the misfit ultimately failing in her endeavor and getting shot three times in the chest. She turns to religion in desperate circumstances but even that fails to work. ."A Good Man Is Hard to Find” is a short story with opening comic episodes that belie and foreshadow a tragic ending. The story contains elements of southern Gothic, a fictional genre that vests its stories with foreboding and grotesquerie and replaces the romanticism of nineteenth century Gothic works with realism.” (A Good man is Hard to Find) Religion is of prime importance in the story, the character of the grandmother is arguably the most important, though she is not a true Christian she tries everything within her reach to save herself from the misfit, she literally begs the misfit for her life and asks him to pray but the misfit shoots her three times in the chest and kills her along with her other family members. The selfish character of the grandmother teaches the readers some really important things; the most important of them all is to be selfless unlike the grandmother. Violence is another theme that the story explores; the misfit killing the entire family is a classic example of what is happening in our society today. Murders have become very common and nothing significant has been done to stop this, the grandmother was solely responsible for the killings. She took her cat against the wishes of her son and the cat ran riot which caused Bailey to lose control of the car. They would not have been killed had he not lost control. The selfish character of the grandmother has been very well portrayed by the writer; her selfishness took the lives away of her near and dear ones. The most important question that the story raises is whether the grandmother was a good Christian or not? Her character constantly transforms as the story progresses, she has been seen as a selfish woman in through-out the story. She did not do anything as her family members were being taken to the woods and shot, all she thought about was saving her life and escaping that particular ordeal. She pretends to be a good Christian but she fails to be one, she reaches out and touches the misfit who shoots her and brings her selfish existence to an end. It is very debatable whether she was being selfish or whether she had realized that she had led a selfish life when she reaches out to the misfit. She tries her best to salvage the situation; she wanted to distract the misfit by telling him about the powers of Jesus Christ but the misfit was in no mood to listen and he was a cold blooded murderer who had murdered her entire family, as expected the misfit shot the grandmother and her attempts to save herself completely failed. “Can it only be understood religiously, as O'Connor would argue herself? What might the extreme situation have to do with bringing about such a moment? Can such a sudden transformation really happen at all, or should we disbelieve it? Perhaps at some point in your life you or someone you know will experience a "transformative moment." Or claim to have experienced it. And on that issue too, you'll find plenty of food for thought in this little story.” (A Good Man is Hard to Find) The story can be interpreted in many ways; the readers are the best judges. They are the ones who usually decide about the unanswered questions in the story. Author and Pretence Pretence plays an important role in the society, at some point we have all pretended but there are many a time when we know that there is absolutely no way out but to pretend, for instance the Grandmother pretends to be a true Christian in the story but in reality she is far from it and this has serious ramifications. When the car meets with an accident, the grandmother fakes an injury so as to gain sympathy. She forgets the way and the city the house was in and this was again an instance of pretence. The grandmother pretends to be injured so as to divert the attention towards her injury, had she not pretended then her son would have scolded her and it would have been bad for her, the funny part is that she thinks she is a true Christian in spite of pretending repeatedly in the story. This also goes to show a lot about the author, the author must have come across people in his life who were full of pretence and this is probably why he decided to write this particular story and this was probably how the character of the grandmother came into the picture. Christian views are of prime importance to the author, the Christian views are echoed throughout the short story. Grandmother is an example of a person who claims to be very religious but in reality is very shallow and full of pretence. She uses every other way to save herself from the misfit, she turns towards Christ to save her life even claiming that she had seen Christ, she even stoops to unprecedented extent when she says that the misfit is her son and goes ahead to show compassion by touching the misfit but this trick backfires and the misfit brutally murders the grandmother. This once again goes to show that one should never pretend and fake, one should be sincere and honest. Literary Elements The tone of the author is admonishing but it sounds admonishing only to those who can understand the real meaning of the text, true Christians must never pretend and the author wants the true Christians to stand up and be counted. “The rural southern U.S. is the setting for this famous collection of short stories by one of the greatest practitioners of the form. She does not often give exact locations, state or town names, but most of these stories take place in a rural landscape and many--though not all--of the main characters are women.” (A Good man is hard to find) The author has done fantastic work when it comes to the figure of speeches used in the story, simile and metaphors have been repeatedly used, here are a few examples of the same. “His [Bailey's] jaw was as rigid as a horseshoe (paragraph 49).” The use of word as makes this a simile. [T]he grandmother raised her head like a parched old turkey hen . . . (paragraph 133). The use of the word like makes this a simile. Foreshadowing “The author sneaks into the story words and passages that foreshadow the tragic developments on the dirt road. Consider, for example, the reference to The Misfit by Bailey's mother in paragraph 1. It raises the possibility, however remote, that Bailey and his family will encounter The Misfit. Bailey's mother again foreshadows later developments when she dresses for the trip in her finest clothes so that "in case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady" (paragraph 12).  (A Good man is hard to find) The storytelling technique of the author is very intriguing and it also manages to fascinate the readers. “Also, the narrator tends to offer an exterior view, reporting on details as seen from a distance (both physical and psychological). In this sense, O'Connor's narrators are distinctly omniscient. The pattern does not vary a great deal: there is usually a main character who is depicted extensively, and possibly a major secondary character, and a small group of minor characters. The narrator may move in and out of focus, character by character, very quickly. The tone is usually piercing, expectant, and direct.” (A Good man is hard to find) Religion Religion is of much significance in the story, O'Connor's views are simple to read and understand. He wants people to embrace Christianity, most people these days are unable to do that yet claim to be true Christians and this is what is upsetting the author. He does not want people to pretend and show as though they are very religious and pure like the Grandmother; he wants them to be free of any kind of pretence and to accept who they really are so as to become really comfortable with themselves. Another thing which is really important is that the author does not want true Christians to panic when something unprecedented happens, for instance the Grandmother meets with an accident and it was her bad luck or good luck that she happened to meet the misfit, under such conditions true Christians must never fluster and start pretending, they should never try to be someone else because it is just not plausible for them to be someone else, they have their own identity and the author wants them to follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ, it is surely an arduous task but not an implausible one. The story is very inspiring and the most important thing that everyone must learn from it is not to pretend and just be religious, true Christians never pretend like the Grandmother, she probably would not have been killed had she not pretended. Works Cited A Good Man is Hard to Find. Literature. n.p., Web. Retrieved from: A Good Man is Hard to Find. Foreshadowing. n.p., Web. Retrieved from: A Good Man is hard to Find. Literary Techniques. n.p., Web. Retrieved from: Read More