An Analysis Of A Good Man Is Hard To Find By Flannery O Connor

In" A Good Man is Hard to Find" there are a variety of themes. The themes in this short story are: the grace of the grandmother and The Misfit, the vague definition of a “good man”, and the class of the grandmother. All of these themes are apparent to any reader, but it does not quite seem to match O’Connor’s depth style way of writing. The two characters, the Grandmother and the Misfit change from beginning to end. Even though they are both different as night and day, they both have principles and stand by their principles no matter what the circumstance.

In the short story A Good Man Is Hard to Find, written by Flannery O’Connor, the theme that the definition of a ‘good man’ is mysterious and flawed is apparent. The reader must realize that it is difficult to universalize the definition of a good man because every person goes through different experiences. Thus, these experiences affect his or her viewpoint and in turn flaw ones view on a good man. O’Connor conveys this theme through her excellent use of diction, imagery, foreshadowing, and symbolism as well as through a creative use of repetition and an omniscient point of view.

Flannery O’Connor was an American author who often wrote about characters who face violent situations. These situations force the characters into a moment of crisis that awakens or alters their fate. Her short stories reflect her Roman Catholic faith and frequently discuss questions of morality and ethics. O’Connor’s Catholic upbringing influenced most of her short stories, often accumulating criticism because of her harsh portrayal of religion. O’Connor incorporates the experience of a moment of grace in her short stories to contribute to the meaning of her works and to represent her faith.

In today’s society, several individuals have come across a point where they were on the verge of the death. Murder is constantly being thrown across headlines, news reports, and social media throughout America. It has become a disastrous factor throughout many individual’ lives. Viewing families suffer from their lost loved ones, as well as the murder of innocent lives have been tremendously relevant in today’s society. What many individuals fail to understand, is what actually happens during their last seconds on earth. Throughout the short story, “A Good Man Is Hard To Find,” O’Connor uses a Grandmother to convey to the readers the actually value of goodness an individual tends to gain when confronted with death. Just as revealed in the short story, violence frequently triggers an individual’s actions when presented with death. In “A Good Man Is Hard To Find,” Flannery O’Connor uses theme, conflict, and religion in order to portray the false acts of goodness projected by the grandmother.

The main recurring theme in Flannery O’Connor’s stories is the use of violence towards characters in order to give them an eye-opening moment in which they finally realize their true self in relation to the rest of society and openly accept insight into how they should act or think. This theme of violence can clearly be seen in three works by Flannery O’Connor: A Good Man is Hard to Find, Good Country People, and Everything That Rises Must Converge.

     In the short story, 'A Good Man is Hard to Find', the main character is the grandmother. Flannery O'Connor, the author, lets the reader find out who the grandmother is by her conversations and reactions to the other characters in the story. The grandmother is the most important character in the story because she has a main role in the stories principal action. This little old lady is the protagonist in this piece. We learn more about her from her direct conversation with the son, Bailey, her grandchildren, June Star and John Wesley, and the Misfit killer. Through these conversations, we know that she is a lady raised from a traditional background. In the story, her attitude changes

Flannery O’Connor was a short story author from Savannah, Georgia. She has produced many critically acclaimed pieces and has won several awards for them. Two distinct pieces she wrote are titled The Life You Save May Be Your Own and Good Country People. While both of her stories are unique, the underlying storyboard and character creation process that O’Connor used is the same throughout her stories. Her stories usually involve one or more self-centered woman, a younger person who become the victim of egregious crime, and a conniving male driven by his own motives. Good Country People and The Life You Save May Be Your Own do not stray from this rule. In either story, the narrative is driven around a shocking tragedy that is very unexpected. Even though in the tragedies committed in the book always have a belligerent and a victim, it is not easy to discern who amongst the two are the antagonist and the protagonist. In either of these narratives, the tragedy that occurred within the stories blurs the line between antagonist and protagonist.

The concept of being a “good” person has painted the picture of how people have handled their lives throughout history. On the same note, this concept has also been the subject of much debate; such is the case in Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find”. The protagonist, the unnamed grandmother struggles to find the “good” in others and herself. O’Conner uses foreshadowing, characterization, and a distinct point of view to make her point. In my interpretation, her point is that only through conflict and turmoil can good truly be found.

Flannery O’Conner, a Gothic literature writer, has written several short stories throughout her life. Among these stories, two of them being A Good Man is Hard to Find and Good Country People, she has included some of the most fleshed out and grotesque characters I have ever read. O’Conner brings her characters to life throughout her writing in near flawless and subtle detail with ironic humor. For example, O’Conner makes skillful use of ironic names for her characters. The titles and names such as grandmother, the misfit, Joy/Hulga, and the bible salesman are used ironically. These subtle characterizations help guide the reader to the final, and often times ironic, conclusions all her characters deserve.

Flannery O’Connor, undoubtedly one of the most well-read authors of the early 20th Century, had many strong themes deeply embedded within all her writings. Two of her most prominent and poignant themes were Christianity and racism. By analyzing, “A Good Man is Hard to Find” and “Everything that Rises Must Converge,” these two themes jump out at the reader. Growing up in the mid-1920’s in Georgia was a huge influence on O’Connor. Less than a decade before her birth, Georgia was much different than it was at her birth. Slaves labored tirelessly on their master’s plantations and were indeed a facet of everyday life. However, as the Civil War ended and Reconstruction began, slaves were not easily assimilated into Southern culture. Thus, O’Connor grew up in a highly racist area that mourned the fact that slaves were now to be treated as “equals.” In her everyday life in Georgia, O’Connor encountered countless citizens who were not shy in expressing their discontent toward the black race. This indeed was a guiding influence and inspiration in her fiction writing. The other guiding influence in her life that became a major theme in her writing was religion. Flannery O 'Connor was born in Savannah, Georgia, the only child of a Catholic family. The region was part of the 'Christ-haunted ' Bible belt of the Southern States. The spiritual heritage of the region profoundly shaped O 'Connor 's writing as described in her essay "The Catholic Novelist in the Protestant South" (1969). Many

O’Connor first expresses her views in her short story, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” by using the literary element of point of view. Point of view is an important literary element in O’Connor’s short story, because it expresses her views on the grandmother and her “role as grace-bringer” (Bethea 2006). Point of view is expressed in her story by the main character the grandmother, a woman who lives with her son and tries to convince her family to go to Tennessee to avoid the Misfit. Point of view is especially important in this story because it lets the reader know what the grandmother is thinking and her actions that involve the main conflict of the short story. For instance, in “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”, the

The story “A Good Man is Hard to Find”, by Flannery O’Connor, is about nuclear family in the 50’s who decided to go to East Tennessee for vacation instead of Florida. The grandmother said that the way Tennessee opposes the Misfit, a criminal who escaped from jail, was one of the main reasons for her choice. On the way, the grandmother suggests going to an old mansion she once visited by deceiving the kids to force Bailey to seek out the place but the grandmother made a mistake with the location. Embarrassed, the grandmother jerks her feet and Pitty Sing, the cat, escapes the basket and surprises Bailey, who wrecks the car. Later, the family meets the Misfit and his partners and the Misfit kills them all after the

Brutality, humor, religion, and violence are a few themes portrayed throughout many of Flannery O’Connor’s short stories. In many of her short stories, O’Connor exposes the dark side of human nature and implements violent and brutal elements in order to emphasize her religious viewpoints. In the short stores “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” and “Revelation”, O’Connor explicitly depicts this violence to highlight the presence and action of holy grace that is given to a protagonist who exudes hypocritical qualities.

O’Connor borrowed these characteristics from her life and used them in the complex characters she would later create. Her Catholic faith is another point that drove O’Connor’s writing, especially given that she grew up in a Protestant-majority region. “Flannery O'Connor put much conscious thought into her dual role of Catholic and fiction writer” (Galloway). Her devout faith plays a huge role in her writing, as most of her characters grapple with salvation and grace. O’Connor’s influences in life were so powerful, they became the same topics that impacted her philosophy in writing.

To the uninitiated, the writing of Flannery O'Connor can seem at once cold and dispassionate, as well as almost absurdly stark and violent. Her short stories routinely end in horrendous, freak fatalities or, at the very least, a character's emotional devastation. Working his way through "Greenleaf," "Everything that Rises Must Converge," or "A Good Man is Hard to Find," the new reader feels an existential hollowness reminiscent of Camus' The Stranger; O'Connor's imagination appears a barren, godless plane of meaninglessness, punctuated by pockets of random, mindless cruelty.