A Violent Illumination of Salvation
Flannery O'Connor uses violence to return characters to reality and prepare them to accept their moment of grace. The New Encyclopedia Britannica defines grace as the "spontaneous, unmerited gift of the divine or the divine influence operating in man for his regeneration and sanctification" (401). At any cost, a soul must find salvation. O'Connor states, "In my own stories I have found that violence is strangely capable of returning my characters to reality and preparing them to accept their moment of grace" (qtd.in Bain 407). Dorothy
Walters, Associate Professor of English at Wichita State University, believes
O'Connor's single theme is the battle between God and the devil "dueling
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O'Connor portrays two varieties of sinners who possess either excessive pride or aggressive evil traits. The price of redemption is high. O'Connor violently shocks her characters, illuminates their shortcomings, and prepares them for redemption as seen in: "A Good Man is Hard to Find," "Revelation," "The River," and "The Lame Shall Enter First."
Walters reasons, "The instruction of pride through lessons of humility is, in each story, the means by which the soul is prepared for its necessary illumination by the Holy Spirit" (73). The grandmother in "A Good Man is Hard to
Find" and Rudy Turpin in "Revelation" is each convinced that she is a lady of elevated status. When threatened by superior beings, their self-imposed facades fall. Inherent human weaknesses are not tolerated and the faulty soul is damned or violently returned to reality (Walters 72). In The Habit of Being, O'Connor emphasizes: "My devil has a name . . . His name is Lucifer, he's a fallen angel, his sin is pride, and his aim is destruction of the Divine plan"
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Walters suggests that although Rufus' actions are destructive, he struggles against "an insistent pull toward salvation." He steals a Bible to teach Norton basic religious principals, demonstrating that he has not forsaken
God. His "devouring" of the pages validates his faith (102). Walters further implies that without God, Rufus will continue his life of crime and be damned; with God, Rufus may become a preacher. He must choose (104).
Dorothy McFarland, editor and critic points out that the Misfit's actions are more terrifying than Rufus's, because he remains well-mannered while committing sinister acts against society (19). He politely apologizes to the grandmother for appearing before her without a shirt and asks if she would "mind calling the children" (O'Connor, A Good 21). The fugitive Misfit "cannot find salvation or meaning to life" because he is aware of his "fallen condition" in a society of people oblivious to their faults. Without God, a "good man" doesn't exist and with God, he knows that he is a "sinner" (Masterpieces
Religious Imagery in Flannery O'Connor's The Life You Save May Be Your Own. The religious imagery in Flannery O'Connor's The Life You Save May Be Your Own gives the story a cynical undertone along with a healthy dose of irony. O'Connor uses allusions to Jesus and Christianity to examine the hypocrisies of the religion and its adherents. Her character Tom T. Shiftlet is portrayed paradoxically as both the embodiment of Christ and an immoral, utterly selfish miscreant.
“A Good Man Is Hard To Find” was written in 1953. The story demonstrates a broken family who can barely tolerate each other, going on a trip to Florida. Coincidentally, The Misfit has escaped from prison and is headed in the same direction as them. The grandmother continually attempts to persuade Bailey, her son, to go to destination that is not on their agenda. The only exception to their deviation of their route leads to The Misfit, who is a symbol of the grandmother’s salvation and the reality of everyone’s death. An individual’s misconstrued truth about their identity can falsify and taint their religion, therefore, leading them to beg for salvation. For example, in “A Good Man Is Hard To Find”, the grandmother manipulates everyone, compares the past to the present, and believes so passionately in her “lady hood” that it becomes her religion.
“A Good Man is hard to find,” a short story written by Flannery O’ Connor, is one of the most interesting stories I’ve ever come across to in my life. Born as an only child into a Catholic family, O’ Conner is one of the most “greatest fiction writers and one of the strongest apologists for Roman Catholicism in the twentieth century (New Georgia Encyclopedia).” She was a very strong believer in her faith and she used her stories as a tool to send the reader a message that were most likely ignored and almost never uttered out loud. The story revolves around a grandmother who believes to be high and mighty around others. This results in her downfall later on.
The grandmother; is not godly, prayerful, or trustworthy but she is a troublesome character. She raised her children without spirutuality, because she is not a believer, she is Godless.
In the short story, A Good Man is Hard to Find, by Flannery O'Connor, every object including the characters are symbols. The Grandmother, who is the one and only dynamic character, represents all of us who have repented. The story is, as Flannery O'Connor has suggested a spiritual journey because of the Grandmother's Plight. In the beginning of the story the Grandmother is obsessed with everything worldly and superficial. She cares far too much about how others perceive her,
In "A Good Man is Hard to Find" the Grandmother is a main character that symbolizes a savior. O' Connor describes the Grandmother as a savior with grace, who is saving the Misfit from evil. ." O’Connor determinues that the Grandmother shall be the Misfit’s savior, even though she may not seem so in the story” (Bandy, 151). She reaches out to the Misfit with a "touch of grace" because she is portrayed as the "good character" in the story. The Grandmothers purpose is trying to save the Misfit, or the "evil character." At the end of the story, when she was talking to the Misfit after she realized that he was going to kill her she murmurs, "'Why you're one of my own babies. You're one of my own children!' She reaches out and touches him on the shoulder. The Misfit sprang back as if a snake had bitten him and shot her three times through the chest" (O'Connor). Here the significance is that the Misfit was offered grace from the Grandmother, but denies it. “When the Misfit shoots the grandmother he is recoiling from whatever grace she offers. He is rejecting not just any warmth conveyed in the touch, but also th...
The short story “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor, revolves around the relationship in dialogue between the grandmother of the travelling family and The Misfit, the serial killer that oversees the murder of this family. Throughout the process of the grandmother attempting to persuade The Misfit not to dispatch the desperate travelers, both characters turn to religion as a means of justifying the course of their lives. While The Misfit and the grandmother are struggling to make sense of their lives and going through times of tension, they both become frustrated with what they perceive to be religion taking control in their lives. Regarding religion, this story suggests that when times become difficult it is easy for one to lose
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Satan’s aspired manner of conduct, his absurd attempts to battle God, and his misleading craftiness construct his intriguing and vital character in John Milton’s Paradise Lost. As illustrated in Paradise Lost, The Screwtape Letters, and Scripture, Satan is a vicious baleful demon who uses deceitful strategies for his own ambitious gain. Satan’s power of manipulation, form shifting, and his own free will, led to his fall as the ruler of hell.
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In A Good Man is Hard to Find, the grandmother and the Misfit both experience a life-changing event that leads to them having a clear understanding of who they should truly be. After the Misfit kills the rest of the family, the grandmother is left alone with the Misfit in the ditch. Once she sees the Misfit wearing her now dead son’s shirt, she is reminded that the Misfit is no worse than she is (Whitt 47). She is reminded of her son because of the shirt, but this thought inspires an even deeper understanding and thought beyond being confused as to why he is wearing that shirt (Whitt 47-48). She goes as far as to tell the Misfit “Why you’re one of my babies. You’re one of my own children!” (Whitt 47). She realizes that her beliefs and thoughts of the old fashioned southern social class structure that everyone must be good or they must be beneath an individual do not make sense or is applicable when faced with a serious event in life such as death (Whitt 47). The Misfit is taken back by what the grandmother has said to him and quickly shoots her three times without thought, as if by instinct, “as if a snake had bitten him” (Whitt 48). The truth that the grandmother speaks is too much for the Misfit to the point that he violently tries to reject it. Even though the grandmother is dead...
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