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Summary of a good man is hard to find theme
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The Mysterious Misfit
The story “A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” by Flannery O’Connor, focuses on the interaction between a grandmother from Georgia and The Misfit, a self-admitted convict who has recently escaped from jail. The Misfit is first introduced in a newspaper article being read by the grandmother: “This fellow that calls himself The Misfit is aloose from the Federal Pen and headed toward Florida and you read here what it says he did to these people” (257). It seems clear that The Misfit must be a cold-hearted killer who is a danger to be near. When an unfortunate string of events finds the grandmother and her family trapped by The Misfit and his two accomplices, the reader begins to learn more about this complicated character.
As the grandmother finds herself at the mercy of The Misfit, she attempts to befriend him by insisting that he is a good man and must come from nice people. The Misfit agrees that he does come from the “finest people in the world” (263), but that he is not a good man. “My daddy said I was a different breed of dog from my brothers and sisters. ‘You know,’ Daddy said, ‘it’s some that can live their whole life without asking about it and it’s others has to know why it is, and this
Clark 2 boy is one of the latters. He’s going to be into everything!” (264). Here we get an insight into his personality. He may not just be a thoughtless killer. He may actually act the way he does because he has thought about things rather seriously, challenging religious beliefs and whether he should follow them or not.
Several times in the story the Misfit tries to victimize himself. He says he “ain’t recalled to this day” (265) why he got sent to the penitentiary even though there seems to be proof that he killed h...
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...anger that The Misfit reveals throughout the story draws sympathy from the grandmother and even from the reader. He believes that if he had actually witnessed Jesus firsthand raising the dead he would be a complete believer and a better person: “I wisht I had of been there. It ain’t right I wasn’t there because if I had of been there I would of known and I wouldn’t be like I am now” (267). The Misfit’s strong and consistent beliefs are what seem to guide his actions and when the grandmother recognizes his strength she finally recognizes her weaknesses and undergoes a sudden change of heart, reaching out to the man who killed those she loved and is about to kill her. That final act of kindness by the grandmother may have struck home with The Misfit who, after declaring that there is no pleasure but meanness, decides “It’s no real pleasure in life” (267).
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Reading this part from “A Good Man is Hard to Find” I would think from The Misfit saying this would really be him feeling sorry that he killed his father. Nevertheless if you are coming at this quote from another point you could think he was losing his real father and also god at the same time. Which would make him feel guilty and become the killer he is today. So before losing his father and becoming a killer he could have been a perfect church boy like anybody would be.
As I read Flannery O’Connor’s short story “A Good Man is Hard to Find”, I find myself being completely consumed by the rich tale that the author weaves; a tragic and ironic tale that concisely and precisely utilizes irony and foreshadowing with expert skill. As the story progresses, it is readily apparent that the story will end in a tragic and predictable state due to the devices which O’Connor expertly employs and thusly, I find that I cannot stop reading it; the plot grows thicker with every sentence and by doing so, the characters within the story are infinitely real in my mind’s eye. As I consider these factors, the story focuses on two main characters; that of the grandmother, who comes across as self-centered and self-serving and The Misfit, a man, who quite ingeniously, also appears to be self-centered and self-serving. It is the story behind the grandmother, however, that evidence appears to demonstrate the extreme differences between her superficial self and the true character of her persona; as the story unfolds, and proof of my thought process becomes apparently clear.
A murderer was in the family’s presence. The grandmother was begging for grace from the misfit in every way possible. The character of the selfish grandmother, in Flannery O’Connor’s short story, “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” tries to use her manipulative ways to fight the Misfit’s urge to kill her. She is unrelenting in her actions to control those around her. Grandmother portrays a stubborn, devious character who wants what she wants and is going to see that she gets it.
“A Good Man is Hard to Find,” written by Flannery O'Connor tells a story of a dysfunctional family on a roadtrip to Florida to illustrate the theme of self-awareness. The main protagonist in this story is the self-centered Grandmother whose lack of self-awareness is the reason why her family, including herself, are murdered by The Misfit (the Floridian convict). Throughout the story, the Grandmother considers herself as a good woman; however, it is through dialogue that reveals her true self. In reality, she is selfish, manipulative, inconsiderate, and dishonest. No matter how much she attempts to manipulate others into thinking she is full of integrity and a good example to follow, her actions contradict everything she wants people to believe.
“A Good man is hard to find,” is about a family who decide to go on a trip to Florida. The story revolves around a self absorbed grandmother who loves to talk about how everything used to be back in her day and takes the time to dress herself so that “In case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady (358).” She sneaks the family cat with her despite her son’s disapproval of bringing the creature along violating her boundaries to how a lady would act. The family encounters an accident along the way and happens to come across ‘The Misfit,’ a runaway criminal. Using ‘The Misfit’ as a tool, O’ Connor sends a message to her readers of how hypocritical a person can be when it comes to belief.
After the accident that the grandmother had unintentionally caused by manipulating the image of a nonexistent house into her family’s head, they run into the Misfit. No one else in the family knew who he was or anything about him. They all thought someone had come to their rescue and was going to fix the car, but nothing gets over on the grandmother. Blatantly putting the whole family in danger she blurts out, “’You’re the Misfit!’…’Yes’m…but it would have been better for all of you, lady, if you hadn’t of reckernized me’” (192). At this point in time, she knows that she is going to die, trying to save herself and not caring about the rest of her family clearly as she has witnessed the Misfit’s goons kill off her whole family, she tries to manipulate him. She brings up that he is a “good man at heart” (192) and telling him if he “would pray…Jesus would help” (194). That was just simply her trying to plea for her life, but when she realized she was getting nowhere her “head cleared for an instant” (196), she knew this was an opportunity to try and manipulate the Misfit into letting her go, to make him feel like he didn’t have to be a killer anymore, to comfort him “she reached out and touched him on the shoulder” (196). The Misfit jolted away and shot her three times in the chest because he saw through her manipulative ways which if clear when he
The grandmother is portrayed as being a selfish self-involved woman who wants her way, a person with little memory, just a basic old woman living with her only son. The Misfit on the other hand is a man who feels he has done no wrong, but has just been in the wrong place at the wrong time, but in the end comes too close to the truth, which scares him.
Flan nary O’Connor’s short story “A good man is hard to find” shows a family on their way to Florida for a short vacation met there untimely dead in the hands of a known notorious criminal called “misfit” as the title suggest the men in the story were short tempered, violent and murderous in nature. From the story it was seen that a good man was indeed difficult to find, as the author portrayed the character misfit to be terrible and that alone changed the story to be about the survival of the grandmother in the hands of a fierce criminal. The violence in the story was used to mask the purest moment of the grandmother. The confrontation between the grandmother and misfit were centered on religion (Jesus). The grandmother used prayer to appeal
Elmore Leonard once said “I don’t judge in my books. I don’t have the antagonist get shot or the protagonist win. It’s just how it comes out. I’m just telling a story.” “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”, written by Flannery O'Connor, is one of the most interesting stories that we have read in this class. The protagonist in this story is the grandmother and the antagonist is The Misfit. In any other short story, the protagonist and the antagonist would not have much in common, but that is not the case in “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”. The three major similarities between the grandmother and The Misfit is that they are both the oldest one in their groups, they are both hypocrites, and they both are missing important spiritual relationships.
In her well-known short story, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” Flannery O’Connor skillfully describes the difficulty of finding a morally upright human being, whether it is a man or a woman. No one is perfect, everyone has inadequacies and shortcomings, and she presents this cleverly in her story. She is able to support this view of mankind through her characters. They are self-centered, egotistical human beings who can be judged by their words and actions. This is especially true of the protagonist (the grandmother) and the antagonist (the Misfit). The grandmother tries to portray herself as a virtuous woman, but in the end O’Connor shows that her actions are always self-serving and that morally, she is not that different from the Misfit.
When one first begins to read A Good Man is Hard to Find, by Flannery O’Connor, one is assailed by the humorous petty grievances of a mother living under her son’s roof disrespected by her grandchildren and lonely in a house filled with people, clutching at memories of days long passed similar to the Tennessee Williams play, The Glass Menagerie. As the story unfolds one begins to see the indifference of Bailey toward his family in general and especially his mother—rightly so, as the ‘old lady’ nagged her son and his family to the point of hilarity and rib-hurtin’ laughter had the cat stayed in the bag and the car did not leave the road. This interesting story of a mentally abused woman slighted by her family, who makes the fatal error in judgment by smuggling a cat into the automobile resulting in the unforeseen horror delved upon them by the escaped convict, ‘Misfit’ and his cohorts culminating in a self-fulfilled prophecy—negative thoughts give naissance to deleterious actions.
The Misfit tells the reader “My daddy said I was a different breed of dog from my brothers and sisters. ‘You know,’ Daddy said, ‘it’s some that can live their whole life out without asking about it and it’s others has to know why it is, and this boy is one of the latters. He’s going to be into everything!’ ” (O’Connor 1312). The Misfit never backed down from anything which is why his life is the way it is. The Misfit was the one, not good but not the worst either, person to make a stand and to ask why to justice system and his religion. These are the two belief systems that most won’t ever question, which is why the Misfit is such a controversial character. He will never stop asking, and will go against whatever to do what he sees fit, whether it be killing a man or changing his tire.
While analyzing the grotesque character in A Good Man is Hard to Find many things stood out. First the grotesque character’s name was "the Misfit." On page 11, he defines the meaning of his name by stating that, "he couldn't make what he did wrong fit with his punishment." This means that he considers himself a "misfit" not defined as an outcast, but defined as if he were unexplainable. His character is smart because he learns from his mistakes, but he also escaped from the Federal Penitentiary. On page 10 his character is trying to recollect what his crime was, as he is going through his thoughts with the grandmother he states that he wouldn't sign anything he could never get a copy off because that is why he was in the penitentiary in the
In “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” the readers are lead to believe that the Grandmother is a good Southern woman who lives her life by God’s grace, and the Misfit is a horrendous, murderous, mad man that believes in nothing. Although these first impressions seem spot on at a first glance, the actual characteristics and traits of these characters are far more complex. The Grandmother and Misfit have a very intriguing conversation before he murders her, but in the short time before her death, the readers see the grandmothers need for redemption and how the murderous Misfit gave her the redemption she so desperately needed,
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...