A Good Man Is Hard to Find
In Flannery O’Connor’s short story, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” the character of the Grandmother is a woman who believes she is a lady of high values and morals. O’Connor depicts the grandmother as a selfish and deceptive hypocrit, who stops at nothing to get her way. The Grandmother demonstrates numerous acts of deception, which shows she has no consideration for any of her family members. The selfishness is so much a part of the Grandmother that she wears the selfishness like a coat is needed in zero degree weather.
Bandy also quoted in the essay, “In our first view of the Grandmother, we witness a chilling demonstration of her selfishness.” It is very obvious the Grandmother is concerned with her gaining and nobody else’s and it appears she finds nothing to wrong with the idea. When the family encounters the Misfit and the Grandmother recognizes him as the Misfit, she quickly asked him, “you wouldn’t shoot a lady, would you?” She shows no concern about the rest of the family and continues to plead with the Misfit for her life only. The Grandmother exaggerated a lot, for example she told the Misfit, “we turned over twice,” when they actually turned over once. Perhaps, this was another way of deception to gain her empathy from anyone she could.
In Stephen C. Brandy’s essay, “One of My Babies,” he quoted, “the grandmother’s petty acts of deception are, it seems at first glance merely that- petty acts. Profoundly dishonest, she stops at nothing ...
Amanda Ripley argues in The Atlantic in her article “The Case Against High School Sports”, that the United States place too much attention on sports rather than academics. Ripley argues that sports programs at schools should be reduced, maybe even cut out completely. She states that there are a lot of countries that outperform America on international tests, and it is because they put more of their emphasis on academics, where the United States puts more of an emphasis on athletics. Ripley says that high school sports negatively affects academics. (1). I disagree with Ripley on this topic; I think that sports are important for young kids because it teaches them very valuable life lessons and it keeps them out of trouble.
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.
The Grandmother’s deviousness and immorality is evident in the beginning of the story. While reading the newspaper article about the Misfit, the Grandmother brings it to Bailey’s attention. In Short Story Criticism, Mary Jane Schenck writes “For Bailey, the newspaper story is not important or meaningful, and for the Grandmother it does not represent a real threat but is part of a ploy to get her own way” (Schenck 220). “A Good Man is Hard to Find” begins with an innocent road trip, however, due to coercion by the Grandmother; it soon turns into a fatal nightmare. In Short Story Criticism, Martha Stephens writes “… it is true that in a trivial sense everything that happens is the Grandmother’s fault…” She continues with “It is in the conscious of the Grandmother that we continue to experience the action of the story…” (Stephens 196).
Although this story is told in the third person, the reader’s eyes are strictly controlled by the meddling, ever-involved grandmother. She is never given a name; she is just a generic grandmother; she could belong to anyone. O’Connor portrays her as simply annoying, a thorn in her son’s side. As the little girl June Star rudely puts it, “She has to go everywhere we go. She wouldn’t stay at home to be queen for a day” (117-118). As June Star demonstrates, the family treats the grandmother with great reproach. Even as she is driving them all crazy with her constant comments and old-fashioned attitude, the reader is made to feel sorry for her. It is this constant stream of confliction that keeps the story boiling, and eventually overflows into the shocking conclusion. Of course the grandmother meant no harm, but who can help but to blame her? O’Connor puts her readers into a fit of rage as “the horrible thought” comes to the grandmother, “that the house she had remembered so vividly was not in Georgia but in Tennessee” (125).
In Flannery O’Connor’s A Good Man is Hard to Find. We meet an older woman simply known as the Grandmother. She is a prideful, selfish and ignorant person. Throughout the story she manages to make situations harder and harder for the characters until she leads them all, including herself to their demise. One could easily read the story and see her being a fairly flat character, but that would not be a quality interpretation. Instead there is so much more beneath her attitude, that not only makes her more interesting, but also relevant to humanity. O’Connor, being a Christian, writer inadvertently leaves vivid Christian imagery in her story. We see this in three distinct places, first in her general personality and how that affects those around her. Next, we relate more in her reaction to the outside force of adversity that the Misfit places upon her. Finally, and most importantly she experiences her eventual moment of grace and redemption.
Armond Boudreaux achieves his purpose in his article by switching the perspective of what the grandmother considered to be a good man, and what the
The Stamp Act of 1765 was the beginning of the revolution for the colonies of North America. When the Stamp Act was passed by the British Parliament, it required American colonists to pay a tax on every piece of printed paper they used. This included ship’s papers, legal documents, licenses, newspapers, and even playing cards. However, in the past, taxes and duties on colonial trade had always been viewed as measure to regulate commerce but not to raise money. Therefore, England viewed this taxes as a direct attempt to raise money in the colonies without the approval of the colonial legislatures. Due to this effects, the Stamp Act provoked such a violent reaction in the colonies, because it was seen as a threat to the colonist’s liberties and rights, as well as affecting multiple members of the society.
The state of Georgia earned the nickname "The Empire State of the South" in the antebellum period largely because of its textile industry. From 1840 until 1890 the state consistently led the South in textile production,
The Stamp Act was a tax passed by Parliament on all printed documents used by the American colonists. The Stamp Act Crisis of 1765-1766 was the first event that sprouted revolutionary thinking in the colonists. Tired of being wrongfully taxed by Parliament the “American Patriots sprang into action” to prevent the tax from being enforced. “In May [1765], Patrick Henry persuaded the Virginia legislature to pass resolutions demanding the act’s repeal.” There were a total of five resolves, each were passed during the meeting of the Virginia House of Burgesses on May 30th because the more conservative leaders had been absent. The fifth resolve stated that only the General Assembly of the Virginia Colony should have the power to levy and collect taxes over its people, it was originally passed but upon return of the other leaders it was retracted.
In the short story “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”, written by Flannery O’Connor, the theme of the mysterious definition of a “good man” is apparent. The true definition of a ‘good man’ is flawed, but one must also realize that it is difficult to universalize simply because every person is entitled to their own opinion. O’Connor conveys this theme through her excellent use of diction, imagery, foreshadowing, and symbolism as well as through a creative use of repetition and an omniscient point of view.
The grandmother is the central character in the story "A good man is hard to find," by Flannery O'Connor. The grandmother is a manipulative, deceitful, and self-serving woman who lives in the past. She doesn't value her life as it is, but glorifies what it was like long ago when she saw life through rose-colored glasses. She is pre-scented by O'Connor as being a prim and proper lady dressed in a suit, hat, and white cotton gloves. This woman will do whatever it takes to get what she wants and she doesn't let anyone else's feelings stand in her way. She tries to justify her demands by convincing herself and her family that her way is not only the best way, but the only way. The grandmother is determined to change her family's vacation destination as she tries to manipulate her son into going to Tennessee instead of Florida. The grandmother says that "she couldn't answer to her conscience if she took the children in a direction where there was a convict on the loose." The children, they tell her "stay at home if you don't want to go." The grandmother then decides that she will have to go along after all, but she is already working on her own agenda. The grandmother is very deceitful, and she manages to sneak the cat in the car with her. She decides that she would like to visit an old plantation and begins her pursuit of convincing Bailey to agree to it. She describes the old house for the children adding mysterious details to pique their curiosity. "There was a secret panel in this house," she states cunningly knowing it is a lie. The grandmother always stretches the truth as much as possible. She not only lies to her family, but to herself as well. The grandmother doesn't live in the present, but in the past. She dresses in a suit to go on vacation. She states, "in case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady." She constantly tries to tell everyone what they should or should not do. She informs the children that they do not have good manners and that "children were more respectful of their native states and their parents and everything else." when she was a child.
The granny and the misfit are two completely opposite characters that possess two different beliefs. The grandmother puts herself on a high pedestal and the way she calls the misfit ‘a good person’ based upon his family background gives the reader an idea of what the grandmother acknowledges to be considered as ‘good’. Self absorbed as sh...
In “A Good Man is Hard to Find” Flannery O’Conner tells the story of a family in route to their Florida vacation and the trouble the grandmother gets them in. The grandmother does not want to go to Florida on vacation and tries many methods of changing her son, Bailey’s mind. Although she tries many methods, none of them have the effect on him she desires. Bailey is as stubborn as his mother, completely shutting the door on every proposition his mother makes. When she finally makes some progress in delaying their travels things go horribly. Bailey and his family discover the hard way just how ironic life can be.
For decades there has been a debate on student athletes and their drive to succeed in the classroom. From the very beginning of organized college level athletics, the goal to want to succeed in athletics has forced students to put academics to the back burner. In spite of the goal to want to succeed over a hundred years of attempts to check limits of intercollegiate athletic programs on colleges' academic standards still seems to struggle to this day. This brings to surface one of the most asked questions in sports, “What effect does college sports have on academics and economics?” Herbert D. Simons, Derek Van Rheenen, and Martin V. Covington, authors of “Academic Motivation and the Student Athlete” researched the topic on whether athletics and academics benefit each other. Bryan Flynn, the author of “College Sports vs. Academics” poses the question “Should institutions of higher learning continue to involve themselves in athletic programs that often turn out to be virtual arms races for recruiting talented players who bring big money and prestige, but put academics to the back burner?” Although both authors agree that sports have an impact on an athlete’s academics, the focus of their argument differs.
Sports programs have been an integral part of all schools. They support the academics of the school and therefore foster success in life. These programs are educational and help produce productive citizenship. They help students experience and build skills that may help them in their future, like interpersonal and time management skills. Education may kindle the light of knowledge, but sports help to maintain the proper physique. Sports are also an important means of entertainment and a use for energy after long hours of study. Sports increase a student’s performance not only in the classroom but also in their life.