A Good Man Is Hard to Find: Analisys 4

Two more pertinent points are made by the author, in regards to the grandmother, follow in quick succession; both allude to further yet-to-be seen gloom within the story. O’Connor writes of the grandmother “[s]he didn’t intend for the cat to be left alone in the house for three days because he would miss her too much and she was afraid he might brush against one of the gas burners and accidentally asphyxiate himself” (1043) and of the way she is dressed “[i]n case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady” (1043). These two observations are innocent enough on the surface but provide true intent on the foreshadowing that O’Connor uses throughout the story. It is these two devices, irony and foreshadowing, that I feel are prominent and important aspects of the story and are evidenced in my quest to decipher this story.

Southern family preparing to go on what seems to be a typical vacation. The story is humorous at first because the reader is unaware of how the story will end. The tone changes dramatically from amusing to frightening and plays an important part in making the story effective.

The story begins in Georgia in the 1940’s-1950’s with the Grandma as the main character who is trying to manipulate her son named Bailey and his wife from traveling to Florida because of the danger of a man called The Misfit who has escaped from prison and instead tries to persuade them to travel to Tennessee. Eventually, the Grandmother doesn’t succeed at convincing him to travel to Tennessee so both of them head off toward Florida along with Bailey’s wife, their young daughter June, their eight year old son John Wesley, the young baby, and Gandmas cat. They drive for a while and Grandma talks to her granddaughter of her early days when she was a maiden

As they continue down and endless road the cat springs free from the hiding place in which the grandmother placed it, which causes Bailey to loose control and wreck. While sitting on the side of the road a car with 3 men pulled over one the grandmother stupidly introduces him to everyone as The Misfit. One by one each person is taken to the woods and shot while the grandmother tries to spare her life with The Misfit. Suddenly with the threat of death near her door she suddenly tries to be something she is not. She sympathizes with him and tries to relate to him. All of this comes to no avail if anything it antagonizes him which throws a switch in his mind and he reacts the only way he knows how, by shooting her in the chest and putting his problem to an end.

For example, Bailey does not want her to carry the cat to their journey. However, grandmother does not listen to him and she hides the cat inside the car in a basket and thus secretly brings the cat along with her. On their way, she also wants to go and visit the old plantation even though Bailey does not agree to this. In order to see that she gets what she wants, she talks to the children and convinces them to tell Bailey to do as she wishes. The author writes “There was a secret panel in this house…. and the story went that all the family silver was hidden in it when Sherman came through but it was never found . . .” (O’Connor 45). Grandmother says these words craftily in her attempts to convince Bailey to drive to the old plantations even though she knows that she is not telling the truth. Evidently, she leads the family into a dangerous tour drive. In this tour, the family ends up having an accident due to the Pitty Sing cat sneaking out of the car, leaping on Bailey who loses control of the car. She avoids responsibility by pretending to be hurt. Her actions put the family in dangerous situations.

The grandmother hid her cat in a basket, which she puts in the car with her on the day of the trip. The grandmother wears a floral hat and dress, because if she were to get into a car accident people would know she is “a lady”. The two kids June Star and John Wesley clearly dislike their grandmother, it is very clear because they often make remarks to suggest this. The family makes their way through Georgia and they Grandma reminisces about an old suitor she had back in the day when the family passes

When this story started off the grandmother jumped right into selfish mode. Her son Bailey had planned a vacation for his family to Florida, but the grandmother did not want to go so she tried to get Bailey to go to Tennessee instead. After that, the grandmother did not want to leave her cat so she decided to hide it in the car, not even caring about if the cat can go or not. Since the grandmother decided to take her cat it caused them to have an accident when the grandmother had kicked the basket. That made Bailey run off the side of the road because the cat jumped on him.

In the beginning, the grandmother is reading the newspaper where she then learns about the Misfit who escaped prison. The grandmother says, “I wouldn’t take my children in any direction with a criminal like that aloose in it. I couldn’t answer to my conscious if it did” (O’Connor 485). This quote foreshadows as the accident happened with her guidance on the road it is what led them to steer off the main road. They were on and into the arms of who they call the Misfit and his

Now we take a look at the ending. The family had an accident on a back road, flipping their car. This occurred all because of grandmother. She told Bailey that the old plantation was along this way, and that the mansion had a secret panel in it. The kids went nuts to see this passage, and Bailey, the father, gave in and took them down this road to see it. The cat got uncomfortable from the whole situation and

Bailey is the grandmother's son. He does not listen to Bailey about the Misfit and Makes hasty decisions because of whining and griping. He was a driver for the family vacation or trip. In his mind, he's in charge, and he cannot let you forget it. I understand that he was highly addicted by drugs and cannot control himself, much less his family. He tries to keep the appearance of being in control but really isn't. Although it is his idea to go to Florida, it is unclear why he wants to go on a vacation at all. When the family has its unfortunate experience with the Bailey loses it. Even before he knows who Misfit is, the accident itself has already shows the effect of strain in his nerves. Bailey is the grandmother's

She recalled exactly which road to turn on. She knew that her son Bailey would not be willing to lose any time looking at an old house, where she mentions there was a secret panel in the house, encouraging them to take her, as the children began to yell that they wanted to go to the secret panel. Baily said “All right!”... “But this will be the only time we are going to stop for anything like this.” The horrible part was when the car turned over and landed right side up in a gulch off the side of the road.

The grandmother lives her life in denial of what differs a good person to a bad one where the misfit knows this difference. The hearse like automobile is his car that approaches the wrecked car and family. The Grandmother, not thinking of her consequences, points out that he is the dangerous criminal on the loose. He warns her that it was a bad decision to point that out, upsetting her. After talking briefly, he has his henchmen take portions of the family into the woods while he talks to the grandmother.

After riding along a little further, the family is involved in a car accident. The main reason that the family is involved in the car accident is due to the grandmother. The grandmother remembers a mansion that she visits as a young girl. She is eager to go, because she wants the children to see how she grew up. This further states how the grandmother social class, because she lived in a mansion. During the time of the grandmother’s life, only plantation owners and their family lived in mansions. This also stressed the social class of the grandmother, because you can tell from this that the

Fear of the Unknown “To fear death, gentlemen, is no other than to think oneself wise when one is not, to think one knows what one does not know. No one knows whether death may not be the greatest of all blessings for a man, yet men fear it as if they knew that it is the greatest of evils” (Socrates). The works “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Conner and “Guest of the Nation” by Frank O’Conner address the issue of death. Both stories suggest that death is something that we cannot avoid, but in the world we live in death doesn’t always happen in the middle of the night of natural causes. The world is a cruel place and the death of so many people happen by the bullet of a gun.

Bailey is the head of the family and seems to love his mother very much but her needing behavior gets to him at times. He gave into his mothers request of visiting the old plantation house that she thought she had remembered only because the grandmother and children were driving him crazy about visiting this house. Wheneber the grandmothers cat