Flannery O ' Connor 's Good Country People

“A Good Man Is Hard To Find” and “Good Country People” are two short stories written by Flannery O’Connor during her short lived writing career. Despite the literary achievements of O’Connor’s works, she is often criticized for the grotesqueness of her characters and endings of her short stories and novels. Her writings have been described as “understated, orderly, unexperimental fiction, with a Southern backdrop and a Roman Catholic vision, in defiance, it would seem, of those restless innovators who preceded her and who came into prominence after her death”(Friedman 4). “A Good Man Is Hard To Find” and “Good Country People” are both set in the South, and O’Connor explores the tension between the old and new South. The stories are tow

Thesis Statement: In Flannery O'Connor's short story "Good Country People," the expulsion of the outside world allows for more emphasis on the symbolic nature of each of the active characters.

The short story “Good Country People” wrote by Flannery O’Connor is a story that shows many underlining themes about the people around us. One of the many underlying themes is that it shows that people are not always who they say they are, we see this when Hulga/Joy meets the Bible salesman, Manley Pointer. Also, people should not judge others by their looks, we see this when Hulga and Mrs. Hopewell think they are superior over everyone else. Throughout the story, Flannery O’Connor uses his description of characters, dialogue, and the use of the reality he created to show the underlying theme of the story.

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.

What does a story about a very religious, Puritan man who goes into the woods to see a witch party and a story about a con man who steals a girl’s fake leg have to do in common? This may seem like an odd and unusual question, but these short stories by Flannery O’Connor and Nathaniel Hawthorne are similar. The short stories of Good Country People and Young Goodman Brown are different in their plots, but are alike in the personalities and flaws of the characters; both stories having characters who are hypocritical and manipulative.

People in the south often get stereotyped based off their appearances or the way they act. Most southerners have rituals they follow, but some are just living life. The way Flannery O'Connor deals with the traditional social structure in the South in her fiction shows that it was of major concern to her and was the source of much of her power and humor. O'Connor's exposition of a southern society which values a good, moral person yet struggles to identify Three of her short stories deal with the relationship between Christianity and society in the South: "A Good Man Is Hard to Find," "Good Country People," and "Revelation.”

Characterization is the most prevalent component used for the development of themes in Flannery O?Connor?s satirical short story ?Good Country People.? O?Connor artistically cultivates character development throughout her story as a means of creating multi-level themes that culminate in allegory. Although the themes are independent of each other, the characters are not; the development of one character is dependent upon the development of another. Each character?s feelings and behavior are influenced by the behavior of the others.

Flannery O’Connor was born on March 25, 1925, in Savannah, Georgia. She was an American writer. O’Connor wrote two novels and 32 short stories in her life time. She was a southern writer who wrote in Southern Gothic style. In the Article, Female Gothic Fiction Carolyn E. Megan asks Dorothy Allison what Southern Gothic is to her and she responded with, “It’s a lyrical tradition. Language. Iconoclastic, outrageous as hell, leveled with humor. Yankees do it, but Southerners do it more. It’s the grotesque.”(Bailey 1) Later she was asked who one of her role models was and she stated that Flannery O’Connor was one she could relate to. One of O’Connor’s stronger works was “Good Country People” which was published in 1955.

Southern gothic is a type of literature that focuses on the harsh conflicts of violence and racism, which is observed in the perspective of black and white individuals. Some of the most familiar southern authors are William Faulkner, Flannery O’Connor, and Cormac McCarthy. One author in particular, Flannery O’Connor, is a remarkable author, who directly reflects upon southern grotesque within her two short stories, “A Good Man is Hard to Find” and “Revelation.” These two short stories are very similar to each other, which is why I believe that O’Connor often writes with violent characters to expose real violence in the world while tying them in with a particular spiritual insight.

“Young Goodman Brown” and “Good Country People” are short stories written a little more than 100 years apart by Nathaniel Hawthorne and Flannery O’Connor respectively, and they both follow similar themes about religion and faith in a parallel sense. “Young Goodman Brown” follows the story of a devout Puritan losing his faith in God and humanity through a journey in the woods. While “Good Country People” follows the story of an amputee woman who is “tricked” by a fake Bible salesman into going out with him as she is seduced by his Christian principles. Both “Young Goodman Brown” and “Good Country People” depict a story of faith but in reciprocal directions. “Young Goodman Brown” and “Good Country People” argue how one’s faith and identity can so easily be weakened and undermined by outside influences and temptations using techniques and views typical of Romanticism and Southern Gothic respectively.

There are many themes within Flannery O’Connor’s short story “Good Country People”. Religion is definitely one of the more prominent themes that the story holds. Like most of O’Connor’s works, it plays a big part in the actions or characteristics of the main characters. This is all on the surface however. The more important and less accentuated theme is the various facades the characters create for themselves. These facades prevent them from facing their true “grotesque” selves. These facades also hide their weaknesses that they have no wish to face ort just can’t understand. People must be comfortable with every aspect of themselves, because certain people, who in this story

Flannery O’Connor is an American short story writer and her short story “Good Country People” depicts Hulga, a highly educated woman and has a PhD, is being jerked around by an immoral bible salesman. “A good man is hard to find”, also written by O’Connor, is a short story of a grandmother and her family murdered by a horrible man who called “the misfit” during the road trip to Florida. Although “Good country people” and “a good man is hard to find” are written by the same author, many elements in those two stories cause them have similar themes in religion, misplaced trust and protagonist and antagonist.

In the story Young Goodman Brown written anonymously in New England magazine in 1835 by Nathaniel Hawthorne argument how the innocent and the corruptibility are inherent factors living around the people. Hawthorne supports her assertion by explaining that the good and evil can walk together without anybody can recognized each one. The narrator purpose is to convince the audience that the faith and love of god is the only one way to be safe in the live. Nathaniel Hawthorne singed the story in a dark and very dramatic tone, but also in a religious way for adult in society.

“Young Goodman Brown” written in 1835, is a religious allegory written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The story takes place around the 17th century in Salem village and sets in the forest. Hawthorne uses symbolism and allegory to make a point about Puritans. Goodman Brown is a Puritan with strong faith, but the devil overpowers him by showing him the people he trusted have fallen into evil including his wife. Hawthorne uses allegory and symbolism throughout the story conveying a message behind the evilness in puritanism, showing that Goodman Brown himself, having a strong faith in God, falls into evil.

Most people think that the majority of people walking the face of the earth are morally good with a few bad apples here and there. In the short story Young Goodman Brown, Nathaniel Hawthorne uses setting, characters, and plot to show how everyone can be drawn out of their usual character when they are governed by their evil desires.