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A Good Man Is Hard To Find Salvation Essay

1114 Words5 Pages

Through the violence of her short story, Flannery O’ Conner depicts grace and salvation. Flannery O’Conner was a southern rooted writer deeply connected to her Roman Catholic faith and with the use of spiritually conflicted characters she depicted human mortality and the flaws of humanity in her short story, “A Good Man Is Hard To Find.” In this story, O’Connor shares her views of mankind as creatures who have fallen from God’s grace and their journey to rediscover it. The characters in the story face an abrupt dissent into violence. The story is by design meant to shock the reader out of spiritual displacement leaving them to debate the classic Christian mysteries; good versus evil and God’s Grace. The beginning of the story gives the reader a view of the family as disconnected and unappealing. Each member does not respect one another providing the reader with a sense of dissension. This is O’Connor’s attempt to illustrate the dissension of the family and how far from God’s grace they have strayed. The characters will later face their own frugality and become aware that life is finite. Prunty states, “The people who populate O'Connor's "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" are flat yet exaggerated individuals facing their own meanness and mortality.” The immediate focus of the story turns to the grandmother who …show more content…

(McDermott) O’Connor reveals that the Misfit has had a hard life and has never truly fit in. His father was a hard man and new he was different. He bounced from job to job but nothing never settled for one until he was sent to prison. He could not remember what it was for. In the penitentiary, the Misfit was visited by a “head doctor” who said he killed his father. He objected to this notion. Although he his grotesque character the reader can sympathize with

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Due to their similar attributes, the grandmother and Misfit are not drastically different. Neither the grandmother nor the Misfit are purely good or evil; however, they do represent a general reputation of good and evil, respectively. Upon closer inspection, however, there is one fundamental difference between the two characters’ personalities: admission of wrongdoing. This is such a significant distinction that some critics argue that the Misfit’s character is not as corrupted as the grandmother’s because “the Misfit openly acknowledges his evil,” compared to the grandmother’s façade (Desmond). Due to this, the grandmother is not able to connect with the Misfit because she is hiding behind of a false appearance.

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Regardless of the way that he executes her, the Misfit is proposed to have achieved some level of grace as well when he says at the end of the story, "It's no honest to goodness bliss throughout everyday life." Earlier in the story, he declared the main delight out of life was

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A Good Man Is Hard To Find Symbolism Essay

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Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find” was published in 1955. O’Connor was also known for her novel The Violent Bear it Away (published in 1960) and her collection of short stories Everything That Rises Must Converge (published in 1964). The author often used violence and greed to show how she saw humanity that was without God. She liked to write about pettiness and vanity in the rural south, both of which play large parts in “A Good Man is Hard to Find.” This particular piece of work is about a family who goes on a road trip that takes an unexpected turn when they cross paths with a murderer and his henchmen.

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Redemption is the act of being saved from acts of evil and sin. The debate of whether human nature is redeemable or not has been one to plaque religious scholars. In Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find”, this question continues in the interactions between the characters; the most notable being the Grandmother of a rather horrible family and the Misfit, a murderer. While on a road trip, these two characters’ paths collide and lead to a rather unfortunate end where the Grandmother and her family are killed. While many readers believe the ending creates and overall negative tone of the story, some believe that there is a hope for redemption; the story’s author O’Connor who is a devoted Catholic included.

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Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” deals with the flawed moral conduct of a presumed religious figure and a criminal. The Grandmother, who is the protagonist in this story and The Misfit, who is the criminal, are heavily influenced by their environment. Both of these characters show the relationship between environment and identity. O’Connor’s inspiration for this story is rooted in her deeply religious, Catholic beliefs. The author brings the reader down a road which questions if having religious beliefs makes a good person.

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A Good Man Is Hard To Find Relationships Essay

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1254 Words | 6 Pages

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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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