Stupidity should be painful. When paired with a lack of common sense strife usually occurs. In severe cases natural selection transpires. In Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” natural selection literally expunges a single blood line due to the selfish actions of the grandmother. In her story, O’ Connor utilizes foreshadowing in order to effectively orchestrate the family’s untimely death. The family is set to go on a vacation to Florida. Due to her longing for the trip to go to Tennessee, the grandmother “seized every chance she got” (O’Connor 427) to attempt to alter the family’s destination. To her dismay the final destination was never changed. Instead of staying home the grandmother goes with the family because she is “afraid to miss something”(427) no matter how unimportant. When the family leaves for the vacation the grandmother, refuses to leave her cat at home, and in turn decides to smuggle her cat inside a basket because her son would not be very happy with arriving “at a motel with a cat” (427). Little did she know that her precious feline would be associated with the whole family’s demise. While the grandmother was going from one “cat nap”(430) to the next, the family ironically passes through the …show more content…
She is slow to get out of the car for this reason. Inconsistent to her wish to be heavily injured during the wreck, the grandmother emerges from the wreck virtually unscathed. To the dismay of June Star the grandmother, or anyone else was not “killed”(432). The grandmother’s thoughts about potential injury and June Star’s disappointment with no one being killed foreshadows that someone is going to die. Ironically, the grandmother positively identifies The Misfit when he drives up. Now, The Misfit has to kill them in order to insure that they cannot live to speak of his actions, possessions and
When the Misfit arrived with his gang, he gave a few hints to his victims indicating their brutal death. The Misfit arrived in a vehicle described as ."...a big black battered hearse-like automobile." The hearse, which is a vehicle carrying the dead, was the Misfit's vehicle which conveyed the message that he was going to kill the family. Another interesting imagery was when the grandmother asked the Misfit, "`What did you do to get sent to the penitentiary that first time?'" His answer further foreshadowed the death of the family. He said, "`Turn to the right, it
The way the grandmother sneaks the cat into the car and lies about the secret panel brings irony to her beliefs of what it is to be a lady. Her views on the “old south” is established when she calls an African American boy a “cute little pickaninny.” June Star’s remark upon the boy not having britches on leads on to the grandmother’s remark on how he might not be able to afford shows her lack of sympathy towards the less fortunate. This also makes the reader wonder why she even says such a thing in the first place. Instead of reaching out to lend a hand the grandmother ends her statement by simply saying that she would like to “paint a picture” of the scene.
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
The best laid schemes of mice and men often go askew. In the book of mice and men there is George and Lennie who go through a series of events that get them and people around them hurt or in trouble. George and Lennie go through jobs like their nothing. Each time they find a place to work Lennie always does something that gets them in trouble. Steinbeck uses foreshadowing to indicate the deaths of the farm dream, Curley’s wife, and Lennie.
Steinbeck uses foreshadowing because it gives clues about what is going to happen later in the story. In the story George and Lennie have a dream to buy a ranch and have rabbits and make money out of their farm. By the end of the story their dream was not archived. In the book "Of Mice and Men," Steinbeck gives clues about foreshadowing to the reader. In the events of the death of Curley's wife, the death of Lennie, and loss of the dream.
From the beginning of the story, the grandmother’s selfishness is evident. It is revealed that she brought her cat, Pitty Sing, with her on the road trip. The grandmother is hiding the cat in a basket from the other family members. Furthermore, the grandmother decided to bring the cat with her because she was afraid that “he would miss her too much and she was afraid he might brush against one of the gas burners and accidentally asphyxiate himself” (O’Connor). In bringing the cat with her, the grandmother was going against her son
What defines a “good man”? The answer to this question is more complicated than one might think. There is no such thing as a “good man”, simply because nobody is purely good; every person is flawed. This concept is proven in the short story “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor. In this Southern Gothic story, a family takes a road trip to Florida, and along the way, they get into a car accident. Here they run into an escaped convict named “The Misfit”, who murders the whole family. The grandmother, in a moment of desperation, tries to convince the murderer that he is a good man in hopes of him sparing her life - but her plans fail. Through this great story, we see the struggle of good versus evil, and learn that ultimately, evil exists in all of humanity.
In my opinion the parts that helped boost the dramatic interest in the story, A Good Man is Hard to Find by Flannery O'Connor, were the foreshadowing parts of the story. For example, when the family stopped at Sammy's Famous Barbeque, the grandmother started talking to the owner of the restaurant about two fellas who had done him wrong, and from there they started talking about the Misfit, "Did you read about that criminal, The Misfit, that's escaped?" (311), the grandma asked the owner. By talking about the Misfit throughout the story, I feel like it was adding to interest of the readers to know when he was going to appear. A symbol that I noticed in the story was the grandmother's hat, which to me represented her traditions as southern woman. I liked the way O'Connor used imagery to contrast the way the mother of the children looked like and how the grandma looked like by saying, "The children's mother still had on slacks and still had her hair tied up in a green kerchief, but the grandmother had on navy blue straw sailor hat with a bunch with a bunch of white violets on the brim and a navy-blue dress with a small with a small white dot on the print." (309). The climax started when the grandmother realized that the house she was looking for was in Tennessee, I feel like from that moment there was no coming back.
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
In Flanner O’Connor’s “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”, the literary technique of foreshadowing appears in the very beginning of the story giving off hints of the coming dramatic events. O’Connor employs many examples of foreshadowing throughout this story. One example of foreshadowing is: “Here the fellow that calls himself The Misfit is aloose from the Federal Pen and headed towards Florida and you read here what is says he did to these people. Just you read it I wouldn’t take my children in any direction of with a criminal like that aloose in it” (O’Connor 485). This quote increases the possibility that the family may encounter The Misfit on their journey to Florida. The grandma, the main character tries to convince her family to take a
First we will take a look at grandmother. She is made to look like the saint in this story. Her, in contrast to the rest, is the good person, always looking out for the best of others. She is not going on vacation, she is going to visit her "connections" in Tennessee. While
She intentionally lies about the house having a secret panel just to get the kids interest so that Bailey would be more likely to stop and visit. The grandmother is also portrayed as being very loud and outgoing. When the family stops at the restaurant, she carries on a conversation with a complete stranger. She also wants to get up and dance.
Shortly after, the family is about to set off for Florida. After a brief conversation, Bailey forbids his mother from bringing the cat along for the ride. Once again, the Author expresses her view of her self-absorbed, callous mother through the grandmother. Going against her son’s orders, she decides to bring the cat anyways, for fear it may miss her too much or, in a freak accident, asphyxiate itself on on the gas burners. An utterly selfish action for nothing more than getting what she wants, just because she wants it. This action would prove to be disastrous in the end, showing the self destructive behavior of a woman unfit to be called a “mother” by O’Connor.
“You hadda do it.” These two men had a big dream. They looked for work to help them reach their goal. But what was coming wasn’t at all anyone had expected. John Steinbeck uses evidence to show foreshadowing for, the death of Lennie, the death of Curley’s wife, and George and Lennie’s big dream.
Throughout the course of Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men he uses the device of foreshadowing and giving clues of future events very well. In the story he uses it very effectively and very often. The examples of this are shown throughout the story.