Good People David Foster Wallace Summary

In the short story “Good People” by David Foster Wallace, the author teaches the reader a lesson about faith. This lesson is that having a weak faith will make it more challenging to go through life and it creates a sense of emptiness in you as if there is something missing. The author teaches this lesson in many ways throughout the story.

The short story is set at a park by a lake. “They were up on a picnic table at that park by the lake, by the edge of the lake, with part of a downed tree in the shallows half hidden by the bank.”1 The downed tree sets the mood to be sad and dark. We also learn that the main characters Lane A. Dean, Jr. and his girlfriend Sheri Fisher are sitting very still on the picnic table2, which tells us that the atmosphere is quite intense. It does not say for how long they sit by the lake, but it says that the right sides of their faces get shaded so it can be assumed that they sit there for a while.3

In his tale “Good People” David Wallace tells the story of young love and the thoughts of teenagers so called in love faced with everyday life adult choices with a teenage mind. The two being both in ministries and meeting there had a heavy influence on the decisions and their choices. The thoughts that the teens had were questions of faith, belief, and the doings of what is right and what is wrong. The two characters Lane and his girlfriend Sheri find themselves looking for the right choice centered around what brought them together… God. Wallace uses the setting of a park by the lake, both characters wearing white to symbolize purity and holiness with water. The setting that Wallace uses in “Good People” is a lake, a beautiful and pure place where the two characters participated in Christian ministries, while sending across the message of making decisions that could come and happen to anybody in an everyday life bases.

"Every story would be another story, and unrecognizable if it took up its characters and plot and happened somewhere else... Place is the crossroads of circumstance, the proving ground of, what happened? Who 's here? Who 's coming?” Eudora Welty stated this, emphasizing the importance setting has on a story. Authors of all kinds, young and old, famous and not famous, boy or girl—they all have at least one thing in common: setting. In every story a setting is described, sometimes in exceeding detail. Some authors make an attempt to give their audience full understanding of the setting their story is taking place. Many do this by describing the smells, colors, textures, sounds, and sometimes even tastes, to the reader. In many early-American writings, authors go ‘above and beyond’ to help their reader understand the setting, so as to feel what the writer is feeling. Setting often stirs a sense of empathy in the reader’s mind if the descriptions are well-written and captivating. Authors such as Joyce Carol Oates and especially Edgar Allan Poe are well-known for their use of description in the setting. Two very successful stories, written by these authors, are excellent examples of setting. Furthermore, “The Fall of the House of Usher,” by Poe, and “Where is Here?” by Oates both display how the author uses setting to help the reader visualize the situation, create

“Religion in ‘A Good Man is Hard to Find’.” Encyclopedia of Themes in Literature, 3-Volume Set, Facts On File, 2010.

In “A Good Man is Hard to Find”, Flannery O’Connor uses grotesque and flawed characters to reflect her own faith on the Roman Catholic Church. Set in the rural South during the 1950s, O’Connor takes readers on a journey from a satiric family comedy to a brutal cold blooded murder. An analysis of O’Connor’s use of religious symbolism and foreshadowing through characters and setting will be conducted in order to better understand her views and faith of the Catholic Church. This paper will also argue the belief that religious wisdom is the key for moral guidance.

What defines a “good” or “bad” person? The answer is complicated because we all have different perspectives on what we believe to be right and wrong. We as individuals have our own set of ethics by which we try to use when making decisions. However, when a person encounters a difficult dilemma, that choice can impact and even alter a person’s life. “Good People” by David Foster Wallace is an informative and insightful story of a young, unwed, Christian couple that are facing the conflicts of an unplanned pregnancy. Although outwardly this story seems to focus on “to abort” or “not to abort,” the underlying theme focuses on the internal conflicts the young man faces when weighing out the consequences of a decision. David Foster Wallace uses symbolism and an omniscient third person point of view in “Good People” to illustrate the internal battle one faces when dealing with the moral and religious dilemmas such as an unplanned pregnancy.

Discuss how language is used to describe the settings in texts, and explore how the settings shape the events and influence the mood of the narrative

Three specific examples of how setting influenced the actions and attitudes of the characters are: The isolation from a civilized world, the mysteries of an unfamiliar place, and different social types being forced to live with one another. How these examples are to be proven will be developed in the following paragraphs.

David Foster Wallace investigates the confliction of religion’s black and white expectations with the sin of premarital sex throughout his work “Good People.” On one hand, Lane Dean Jr. and Sheri Fisher’s strong affiliation with religion creates a commitment to each other and the well being of the unborn child. However, this commitment becomes offset with the guilt creeping into Lane’s mind. He wanders towards temptation consistently: premarital sex, leaving Sheri on her own to raise their child, and refusing to talk to the religious figures in his life. Without religion, these actions do not sign the contract for eternal damnation. Lane’s religious nature, therefore, creates a level of insanity that originates in fear. That growing insanity snowballs with each internal incident: “Two days before, he had awakened very early and tried to pray but could not. He was freezing more and more solid (Wallace 151). Lane’s perception that he has an inability to pray lengthens the distance he feels has been created between himself and God. Religion does not resolve the conflicts Lane and Sheri have created. Instead, religion creates a new accountability and guilt that intensifies the sin the two students have sunk into.

David Foster Wallace’s “Good People,” is a very touching, powerful story about a young, unwed, Christian couple facing an extremely difficult decision and the moral and religious implications that may result. As the story begins, we are allowed into the head of Lane Dean, a college student, as he sits on a park bench with his girlfriend, Sheri. Lane and Sheri find themselves faced with an unplanned pregnancy, which causes them to battle with several moral and religious dilemmas. Both of them are devout Christians who have built their moral beliefs upon God and their religious upbringing. Although torn Sheri schedules an abortion, which weighs on Lane deeply. Lane, frozen in fear and not having the courage to freely talk to Sheri about

The short story “Cathedral”, by Raymond Carver, is a thought provoking piece that focuses on the transition a man goes through to see the world with his soul. The story gives hope that people can change if given the chance to be better people. Over the course of the story, Carver uses both diction and description to explore themes in religion and morality.

In “A good man is hard to find”, revelations” and “Everything that rises must converge” by Flannery O’Connor clearly portray a theme of racism based on selfishness, pride and grace. All three main characters undergo a prophecy like moment that eventually leads to the loss of their dignity and selfish attitude and in turn they each achieve grace. This paper will provide a detailed analysis on how all three main characters go from being selfish to eventually self-analyzing themselves and in turn they mature and gain grace and change the way they view others. My investigation of these stories will show how each protagonist had to experience some form of tragedy in order to become self-aware of the way people perceive them. O’Connor presents in these stories how each main character and also in reality people in life need to be brought to a tragic like moment in life that causes them to not continue in the ways they are accustomed to.

Write some words or phrases that will help you describe the setting of your story. Where do the events take place? What does it look like there? What does it feel like there?

Knowing Flannery O’Connor’s religious conviction, one cannot overlook this underlying tone in both of her regarded stories “A Good Man is hard to Find” and “Good Country People”. It is often said of those who stand outside of religious conviction that faith seems to come in handy to people only when it is valuable to get them out of a predicament, of which they have likely placed themselves through insensitive behavior and decisions. In such a desperate attempt to appeal to faith, one only finds emptiness and a fate that leaves them hopeless or even dead. O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find” and “Good Country People” illustrate that the inability to see the flaws in one’s self lead to substantial consequences, where an appeal to faith