This essay analyzes Flannery O’Connor’s short story “Good Country People.” The story concerns Ms. Hopewell, her daughter Joy, and their outlook on life; it also discusses the story of their encounter with Manley Pointer, the Bible salesman. The central idea of the narrative is that a man’s overconfidence in his intellectual abilities, and his tendency to see those around him as good, makes him incapable of recognizing a threat.
There are not many characters represented in O’Connor’s short story, but each of them has his own motivation and value system. Thus, the first character the reader is introduced to is Ms. Hopewell, a woman who strives to see only the good: all the people around her, according to Hopewell’s values, are regarded as good. Upon reading, it becomes clear that Ms. Hopewell tends to simplify the world around her. She considers Ms. Freeman and her daughters as good country people, whom she must keep close to her (272). Ms. Hopewell thus adheres to a particular philosophy, trying to accept people with all their faults, especially if they are, in her opinion, reasonable. The excessive tendency to see the world as more positive than it really is a fallacy, for it blinds the critical thinking of the individual, and Ms. Hopewell is proof of this.
Meanwhile, her daughter Joy turns out to be radically different in character, especially with regard to her strained relationship with her mother. Joy lacks Ms. Hopewell’s blind optimism, and she is pessimistic about the good country people her mother is fond of. She believes that they cannot understand her because they are uneducated and she has a doctorate. Joy would not have lived in the village with Ms. Hopewell had it not been for her sick heart. As can be seen from Joy Hopewell’s analysis, like her mother, the girl finds herself held hostage by her own values, beyond which she is unable to look. Her mother is overly optimistic, and Joy is extremely pessimistic, and neither of them is right in the end.
An exciting feature of this story is the symbolism that O’Connor has put into the creation of the names of the protagonists. For example, the last name Hopewell is clearly symbolic and reflects the role that female relatives play in the story. “Hopewell” illustrates hope for the best and a desire to believe in what seems morally right to the characters. Ms. Freeman’s surname as a woman free of any prejudice or preconceptions also turns out to be symbolic. This is what makes it clear over the course of the reading that Ms. Freeman is not inclined to evaluate the people around her with two-figure tones but prefers to study their images in a multifaceted way.
The development of the problem of excessive trust in people based on a lack of critical reflection occurs the moment the reader meets the Bible salesman. When Manley Pointer arrives at the Hopewell home, the reader first sees him from Ms. Hopewell’s point of view. Hopewell sees in Pointer only what the man wants to show: he pretends to be a simple country boy and claims to have the same heart condition as Joy. Furthermore, Pointer makes excellent use of Ms. Hopewell’s weaknesses in such a way as to gain her trust. For O’Connor, if only her mother were exposed to Pointer’s hypocrisy, it would mean an unspoken victory for her daughter’s pessimistic way of thinking. Therefore, the author shows that even to a daughter with a philosophy doctorate, an individual like Pointer can find an approach — in the end, both women find themselves charmed by Pointer show trust in an unfamiliar man.
The other events of the story show the other side of such fascination. What the writer is trying to say is that overconfidence in people and constructed one-sided expectations do not always have positive consequences. This is confirmed during Joy’s date with the Bible salesman, which results in the theft of a wooden leg. Pointer’s phrase to Joy, “you ain’t so smart,” conveys the main point of the story itself: one should not be overconfident with uneducated people, for, in certain situations, they may be more competent (O’Connor 291). It is in this situation, under pressure and in danger, that Joy demonstrates that, in the end, she is not so different from her mother because she is also blind to critical thinking.
In conclusion, the central idea of the story “Good Country People” is that naive stereotypes and overconfidence in the predominance of intelligence can lead a person to collapse. Pointer manipulates Joy and her mother into doing what he wants them to do because they expect him to behave a certain way as a representative of the good country people. He knows their expectations and carefully plays on stereotypes, saying and doing exactly what they expect, to the point where he gets everything he wants and no longer needs them. They cannot think that reasonable people can fool them into thinking they are weak-minded and good-natured, and their self-confidence fails them. The story told by O’Connor proves that in certain situations, good country people can outsmart the PhDs and act out of malice. In other words, one cannot rely solely on trust and optimism, but one must always remain critical and sober-minded.
Work Cited
O’Connor, Flannery. The Complete Stories (FSG Classics). First, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1971.