A Good Man is Hard to Find

Flannery O’Connor’s collection of short stories, A Good Man is Hard to Find, contains some of the most violent and startling, yet extremely humorous works. Throughout these short stories, O’Connor’s outlook on the future of the south quickly becomes apparent, and it’s pretty bleak—borderline apocalyptic. O’Connor feels that modernization represents the biggest problem facing the South. As a conservative Catholic, she believes that modernity will result in people turning their back on religion in order to follow secular pursuits. Due to the rise of industry, people will also become reliant on modern conveniences, forgetting a way of life that was hard, but kept them grounded. It seems that whenever an outsider from the city enters the plot—such as the Misfit, Mr. Shiftlet, Powell Byrd, and Manly Pointer—disaster is bound to shortly ensue. In the “Artificial Nigger”, Nelson's visit to Atlanta is so cataclysmic that it leads him to state “glad I've went once, but I'll never going back again.” I think O’Connor would probably agree.

The crew of characters in O’Connor’s short stories are both grotesque in their appearance and their actions. O’Connor shows no mercy in her characters: they are vile, shameless, and truly capable of anything. Indeed, O’Connor would say that the majority of her characters are grotesque on the outside, as well as the inside. In “The Life You Save May Be Your Own,” Mr. Shiftlet is armless, a trait that evokes empathy from Lucynell Crater; however, despite her belief that a man without an arm would be extremely grateful for anything, he still manages to do the unthinkable: abandon her mildly retarded daughter in a sketchy bar.

Another point that struck me is that in other southern gothic works, those who cling to religion are often exposed as extremely hypocritical. However, O’Connor argues that, despite our flawed nature, we all desire mercy and redemption from a higher authority. Although her characters commit some truly heinous transgressions, they are still deserving of the same salvation available to the morally upright. In “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”, the Misfit commits the cold-blooded murder of the Grandmother, yet she offers him grace in the face of death. Likewise, in “A Temple of the Holy Ghost”, the child finds redemption from her cynicism in church, realizing that the supernatural and reality are intertwined.

Throughout her short stories, there are also a few other Gothic themes. Death is certainly no stranger to O’Connor’s short stories. Indeed, she juxtaposes violent murders next to naturalistic causes throughout her collection in order to remind us of the unpredictability of life. Violence also heavily factors into her short stories, and usually it is at the hands of transient men: the Misfit, Mr. Shiftlet, Powell Byrd, and Manly Pointer. Also, in “The Life You Save May Be Your Own”, “The Displaced Person”, and “A Circle in the Fire”, O’Connor portrays crumbling farms that have become a vestige of their former prime.

Strong female characters also seem to pervade O’Connor’s work; she portrays women that have endured a lot of strife, yet have not given up. The characters of Mrs. Cope, Lucynell Crater, and Mrs. McIntyre represent a group of abandoned women that are left to run estates. Through these characters O’Connor points out that men have a greater mobility in life than women. Women have very few options outside of running the home, and O’Connor captures a feminine endurance in her characters, while drawing attention to the host of options that men possess. In “A Stroke of Good Fortune”, Ruby Hill is also of importance because she represents a “new southern women.” She views pregnancy as entrapment, which is pretty unconventional for a young southern woman. However, she does run into the moral dilemma: when do you stop living your own life, and devote your life to something greater than yourself. Also extremely pertinent to my research is the short story “The Displace Person.” It is important not only because of its portrayal of blacks, but also of immigrants. The concept of racial subordination is something that the family of immigrants cannot understand, which is evident when interracial marriage is discussed, much to the chagrin of Mrs. McIntyre. However, the family of immigrants soon become an economic threat to Mrs. McIntyre, and, since they are foreigners, she does not think it is acceptable for them to have more money. “The Displaced Person” provides a good look into race relations, and seems to argue that people are willing to go only so far to help out others.