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A Good Man Is Hard To Find By Flannery O Connor

888 Words4 Pages

In Flannery O’ Connor’s short story, “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” she presents to her readers a grandmother that gets herself and her family into trouble with a convict, known as The Misfit, while heading to Florida. The grandmother, old and concerned, convincing her son from going to Florida where The Misfit had escaped from. The grandkids aren’t looking forward to the trip with their grandmother. The grandmother hides her cat, Pitty Sing, in a basket so she can take it on the trip. While driving through Georgia, the family stops at a little restaurant called the Tower, owned by Red Sammy Butts. The family and Red Sammy talk about the untrustworthy people in society. When the family returns to the car, the grandmother tells a story to the …show more content…

The grandmother was quite selfish, and only cared for herself and her son. Before the family heads off for Florida the two grandkids tried asking the grandmother why she doesn’t just stay home since she was worrying so much about The Misfit. The children did not like how the grandmother follows them from place to place. The grandmother cares more about her well-being, and money than she does her family. The grandmother makes the comment reliable when she states that, “she would have done well to marry Mr. Teagarden because he was a gentleman and… a very wealthy man” (1011). Comparable to www.blogs.setonhill.edu, the quote, “points out one of the grandmothers most crucial flaws: she values money and material comforts over love and relationships” (Unmentioned). The kids and the grandmother, argues several times throughout the trip. The grandmother even went on, saying how children were more respectful back in her days. The mother, as quiet as she is, didn’t speak to or acknowledge the grandmother much. The grandmother, however, cares more about her son, quite more than the rest of her family. When in all reality, her son didn’t act like he cared about his mother, he didn’t even pay attention to her even when she talked. The son was focusing on getting the grandmother to Florida an abundance more, than hesitating to stop or get distracted. When the family gets involved with The Misfit, the grandmother isn’t concerned for her daughter in-law or her grandkids lives. The grandmother was concerning for only her son’s life and her own. Once her own life was in danger, she then went on to try to persuade The Misfit to spare her life. However, if the grandmother wasn’t so selfish and eager, the family wouldn’t have been involved in with The

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Flannery O 'Connor uses the grandmother to compare it with the Misfit in terms of our social rules about good and bad. According to William Bonney in the moral structure of a good man is hard to find ,The Misfit is the only one in this short story who "asks morally serious questions". Saying that, was he a bad person? After all, he is a person with a big ego and creative intelligence who is victim of his circumstances. Bonney proposes that in "A Good Man Is Hard Find" the relationships are metaphorical, and the grandmother has to affront the "moral" mystery of her dead which provokes "ethical opportunism" which is seen when she starts convincing the Misfit that she is a lady and therefore “You [The Misfit] wouldn’t shoot a lady, would you? "

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