Killing Cleanses and Contaminates - Essay Example

Killing Cleanses and Contaminates Two short stories illustrate one of the most inhumane human acts- the act of killing another human being. Some people tend to instantly judge killers as evil, whatever their intentions may be, but these stories also ask: Is it possible that killing can also lead to something good for both the killers and their victims? In “Killings,” Dubus explores the potential differences between homicide and murder, although it is hard to determine where and who should draw the line that would justify taking a human life. O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find” entails the evil of the Misfit, but it also exposes the evil in the grandmother’s heart. This essay examines the underlying problem of human evil and killing and how Dubus and O’Connor’s stories resolve them. Both writers resolve the problem of dealing with human evil, by demonstrating that killing both contaminates and purifies the killers and their victims, which means that these killers are not entirely good or bad in the end. Killing contaminates the killer, because it is an immoral and irretrievable act. Killing is immoral, because it is not easy to justify the act of taking another person’s life. After Frank is brutally murdered, Matt feels more vulnerable, especially when he sees his wife suffering, since the killer, Richard, freely roams around the town. He confides in Willis and tells him that “she sees him all time. It makes her cry” (Dubus). Willis helps Matt plan the murder of Richard. Together, they justify murder based on the nature and past of Richard. Ruth says: “Dubus invites his readers to ponder the disparity between people’s ethical responsibility to society and the primal urge to protect and avenge their loved ones” (2). Dubus, nevertheless, indicates that killing the killer is not always a moral choice, because it still means that one forcefully takes another person’s life. Matt fully realizes the wrongness of murder, after he does it himself. As Ruth holds him after he tells her what he did, the reverse of what he always does for his wife, it indicates that Matt loses a huge chunk of his humanity. The same immorality can also be gleaned from the Misfit’s murderous acts. His murders surpass what Matt did, because he orders the murder of two children and a baby, as well as their mother and father. In fact, he executes a massacre to replenish his resources, as he runs from the law. In addition, killing is an irretrievable act with permanent consequences. Matt already performs an illegal and immoral act that will hunt his conscience for life. He will feel guilty, even when he can justify his actions. The Misfit has ruined the future of a family. Bailey, his wife, and their children will no longer live and share each other’s dreams and frustrations in life. Like Richard, they are all also buried away somewhere, with no one to cry for them and pay respect to their deaths. These stories, however, imply the possibility that killing also purifies the killers and their victims. Killing results to a “revised moral awareness” of the main characters, although with some differences (Bonney 347). Matt feels redemption as a man. He may not have been able to protect Frank from Richard, but he has defended his wife from Richard’s intrusion on their peace of mind and happiness. Though Matt is tarnished and broken after killing another human being, he is also cleansed from the guilt of not being able to entirely protect his family, especially when he is the “fearful father” (Dubus) type. Killing also cleanses the Misfit, because for some reason, he receives the grace of understanding that his life is meaningless. Initially, he blames everyone else for his crappy life, since he says that he calls himself the Misfit because: “I can't make what all I done wrong fit what all I gone through in punishment” (O’Connor). But his short conversation with the grandmother reveals that he is not a good man. He recounts some of his crimes and punctuates it with his conclusion that there is “No pleasure but meanness” (O’Connor). After the grandmother calls him “one” of her “babies” (O’Connor), he recoils like a snake and shoots her three times. Somehow, the story indicates a change within the Misfit. He tells Bobby Lee that even if he just said that someone should shoot the grandmother “every minute of her life”: “It's no real pleasure in life” (O’Connor). This statement contradicts what he said that to be “mean” is a pleasurable act. It is possible that he has made some connection with the grandmother. He must have realized that she is her “mother,” because like him, she is “alienated from other members of creation” (Keil 45). They share a kinship for human alienation. No one in her family pays grandmother enough attention. For instance, “Bailey didn't [even] look up from his reading,” and when she calls her daughter-in-law, she did not “seem to hear her” (O’Connor). The grandmother has no audience for her superiority complex. The Misfit must have also connected with that superiority feeling which is superficial and hollow. He cracks in emotion when he says he should have been there when Jesus raised the dead: “if I had of been there I would of known and I wouldn't be like I am now” (O’Connor). This reveals his misgivings about his life. Somehow, the Misfit knows that he should blame no one but himself. Killing also cleanses the killed. At first, the grandmother seems to preserve her self-centered self, as she tells the Misfit: “I know you wouldn't shoot a lady! I know you come from nice people!” (O’Connor). This represents her desperate attempt to appeal for her life, if not the life of her family. Later on, she realizes that her murderer has no qualms in killing anyone, as each pistol shot from a distance kills her family. Her religious hypocrisy emerges when she says: “Maybe He didn't raise the dead” (O’Connor). All of a sudden, she loses her faith in God, since this God could no longer protect her. Still, she manages a comeback to save herself, when she calls the Misfit as one of her babies. On the one hand, this can be interpreted as her last effort to save herself by establishing an emotional and spiritual connection with the Misfit. On the other hand, O’Connor may also be saying that she is the Misfit. She cannot fit her society because she is as empty and evil as the Misfit. She feels the same brokenness inside her, because her soul and life are both unfulfilling and meaningless. As a result, after being shot three times, her “face [is said to be] smiling up at the cloudless sky” (O’Connor). It means that she has been enlightened that her life is meaningless, but at least at her death, she realizes its emptiness. The same can also be said about Richard, who awakens to his pointless existence. When Matt shoots him, Richard must have also felt relieved deep inside. He is an angry and violent man and it is ironic that he dies from the same violence he feeds on. Like the grandmother, Richard understands that his death is not futile. He dies from his sins in the same way he made them. Hence, Dubus and O’Connor show that killing is a morally gray area. It may have corrupted human nature, but it also purifies the killers and their victims. Killing cannot be fully justified, whether the intentions are good or bad. These short stories emphasize, nonetheless, that killing can both purify and corrupt humanity. It can corrupt the killers because they commit irreversible and immoral acts. But killing can also cleanse the spirits of the killers and the killed, as they understand how killing can relate to their lives and its meanings. For the Misfit, Richard, and the grandmother, they realize the meaninglessness of their lives. But for Matt, he regains the redemption as a person who only wants the best for his family. In different ways, these main characters are changed inside. They change for the better, though they have done or have received the worst end of life, which is death in its literal and figurative essences. Works Cited Bonney, William. “The Moral Structure of Flannery O'Connor's A Good Man is Hard to Find.” Studies in Short Fiction 27.3 (1990): 347-357. Print. Dubus, Andre. Killings. Web. 22 Sept. 2011 < http://www.randomhouse.com/boldtype/0102/dubus/excerpt.html>. Keil, Katherine. “O'Connor's A Good Man Is Hard To Find.” Explicator 65.1 (2006): 44-47. Print. O’Connor, Flannery. A Good Man is Hard to Find. Web. 22 Sept. 2011 < http://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~surette/goodman.html>. Rush, Irene Struthers. “Killings.” Masterplots II: Short Story Series (2004): 1-2. Read More