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A Good Man Is Hard To Find Literary Analysis

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“For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace”(Romans 6:14). O’Connor’s “A Good Man Is Hard To Find” portrays violence and evil as a means of redeeming grace. The Misfit had done wrong, but Jesus Christ freed him from all of his sins. First, O’Connor’s “A Good Man Is Hard To Find”there was a car accident. The car accident consisted of the grandmother, her son, grandkids, and daughter in law. The Misfit and his acquaintances were able to catch the whole accident from the woods. They, however; saw the accident because they were “watching” said the grandmother (O’Connor 290). Obviously, they were watching because the family was going to be their target. In addition to them watching the family, …show more content…

When the Misfit got down the hill he “turned his head and muttered something to the other two and got out” said the grandmother (O’Connor 290). In the bible, it states “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves” (Matthew 7:15). For the same reason the bible says beware of wolves, the grandmother had recognized who he was. The Misfit! Without a doubt, the grandmother knew exactly what he was capable of doing to her and her family. Even though the grandmother had recognized him as the Misfit, he still offered to fix the car. For instance, we know to never admit to a killer we know who they are because they would feel threatened. The Misfit’s acquaintance Hiram said, “it would take an hour to fix the family car” (O’Connor 291). Ironically, the Misfit, nor his acquaintance were really willing to help, but just to get the family to think they were safe. The bible stated that “it is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in a man” (Psalms 118:8). For this reason …show more content…

The Misfit indeed took precautions before actually killing the grandmother. When the grandmother started talking about the resurrection, the Misfit becomes emotional. The Misfit stated “if I had of been there I wouldn’t be like I am now” (O’Connor 294). I feel like he said that because then he would have seen Jesus really rise from the dead and would know that Jesus was truly real. Furthermore, the grandmother also told him to pray “Jesus would help you” (O’Connor 293). Being the Christian I am I know to always pray even when times are rough. If you just raise your hands to the sky and call on Jesus for help he always made the situation better rather than sitting there trying to handle it all on my own. As a result of the grandmother telling him to pray, the Misfit said, “I don’t want help, I’m doing alright by myself” (O'Connor 293). Even though the Misfit said he did not need help everyone needs help from GOD even if they do not admit it

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The uncertainty that the characters had with one another is a proceeding topic all through O'Connor's short stories, and in her discourse with Red Sammy, the grandmother avows her trust in this idea: "It isn't a soul in this green universe of God's that you can trust. " This conviction denies her Christian confidence. O’Connor’s Christian certainty achieves the achievement of Grace. As she comprehends what’s going on, the grandmother starts to implore that the Misfit pray so that bad situations won’t happen in the future as well as Jesus saving him through his pain. Before the Misfit executes her, the grandmother told him that she considers him as one of her own children, recollecting that the Misfit is as a related human prepared for being saved by God's grace.

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In the last minutes of the Grandmother’s life she tries to persuade the Misfit not to kill her and has a sudden epiphany. The story states, “ She saw the man's face twisted close to her own as if he were going

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One of those that we see in violence. There is a misfit in this specific story. The family finds him when they got in the car accident. This wasn’t a good thing though. The very last sentence of the story explains the violence trait.

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Her care for how she will be observed after decease reveals that she is troubled with the presence of respectability more than the fact of being ethical or “proper.” The grandmother’s hat also makes it visible that she does not precisely clasp the extremity of dying. While the Misfit thinks that the extremity of death makes all Earthly efforts ridiculous and unmeaning, the Grandmother takes into a more accepted look of mortality—focusing on appearances and not thinking too closely around the fact of death. It is no coincidence that the grandma ’s hat is then destroyed when the family does get into a car wreck.

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The grotesque psychopathic nature of the characters in Flannery O’Connor’s, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” ironically shows how a good man does not truly exist through the revelation and proclamation of what characteristics a good man possess. In the story The Misfit shows characteristics of a psychopath by escaping prison and killing an innocent family. However, The Misfit isn’t the only character in the short story to show psychopathic tendencies. The grandma also shows some characteristics of a psychopath because she does not care or show remorse for her family who was brutally murdered

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I wouldn 't take my children in any direction with a criminal like that loose in it. I couldn 't answer to my conscience if I did” (pg. 454). When her son doesn’t comply, she convinces them to at least visit a plantation during their trip. She thinks she knows where she’s going, but her lie leads to the car crashing. After the wreckage, a man appears.

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When a man who saw the accident happen, and explained the car to be yellow, Wilson automatically thought it was me. I had to explain to him that I was driving Gatsby’s car saying, “Listen, I just got here a minute ago, from New York. I was bringing you that coupé we’ve been talking about. That yellow car I was driving this afternoon wasn’t mine- did you hear? I haven’t seen it all afternoon.

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The Misfit replies, “Turn to the right, it was a wall. Turn to the left, it was a wall. Look up it was a ceiling, look down it was a floor. I forget what I done, lady.” Although he was explaining about the jail, the description implies of a small, tight grave exactly what kind of punishment the grandmother is going to

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He thought how peaceful she looked lying there on the ground with her arms wide open alongside her. She lay there with an angelic and peaceful smile. The Misfit pondered over the things grandma said. He felt something it was what she said to him that made him question the things he did and why he done wrong. What made him so angry and why his life turned out like it did.

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She attempted to manipulate him and to draw him into her world by telling him that he is a good man and would not want to kill a lady. He agreed with her but he had no reason to spare her life. Being close to her death she started to realize the bad personality that she had throughout her lifetime and she accepted that she is the same as everyone else. She said to the Misfit “why you’re one of my babies. You’re one of my own children”(O’Connor106).

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Violence is something of a common occurrence nowadays -- bombs in the Middle East to shootings in schools. Those are reckless acts driven by impulse but the opposite it true for literature. In some works it appears to be one of those random or wild act but there is a hidden meaning to all the violence; there is a story behind those hostile words. In Flannery O'Conner’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find” she finds a way to present a quadruple homicide into a mindless act, with heartless diction and torpid tone to illustrate the theme of conflicting definitions of what makes a good man.

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Literary Analysis essay- A good man is hard to find Authors often have a specific purpose to portray the character’s actions or personality. The story “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O 'connor 's shows a story about a family composed of a married couple two children, whose are about to go on a vacation. The grandmother tries to make them change their destiny using the fact that a murderer has escaped jail and that it could be dangerous to go to Florida because of that. The story continues with the journey on their way to Florida.

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In her short story “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”, Flannery O’Connor introduces the reader to a world of family issues, danger, and murder. The story was written in 1955 during a period of social and racial unrest in the southern United States. Mostly, the story follows O 'Connor 's basic Southern Gothic writing style. A work that is "cold and dispassionate, as well as almost absurdly stark and violent" (Galloway). While the quote gives major insight into the theme of the story, it does not offer a glimpse into O 'Connor 's real message of the story.

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1601 Words | 7 Pages

The grandmother uses Jesus as a scapegoat to show how she is a child of God while the Misfit tells of how he really perceives Jesus and that there is no justification of his actions. In the event of the car accident, the Grandmother was left with a physical crisis that quickly showed as her family was sent off into the woods to be killed one by one. This soon transitioned to a spiritual crisis both between the Grandmother and the Misfit as she uses Jesus's name to try and escape her fate. This spiritual crisis leads the characters to express their personal conception of reality and how they perceive the revelation of the situation that they are in. The Grandmother has a sense that reality should revolve around her and that she should manipulate tools such as religion to benefit her outcome.

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The grandmother grew in that moment of death more than she ever did in the little parts that we read about her life, and she dies in peace. Her actions may have even changed the Misfit too. At the end, he says “she would have been a good woman if he 'd been there all her life to shoot her.” (366). This line confused me the first time reading it, but the second time around it made more sense.

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