Flannery O’Connor’s work on the short story “A Good Man is Hard to Find” is the best work and most loved out of all the works he has done on matters of literature. Basically, he vividly demonstrates the weird morality that occurs in real life, whereby immoral people exercise integrity while others who appear to be “good” on the outside exhibit hypocrisy and moral corruption (Antari 364). Precisely on this, Flannery’s work is considered the best since it unmasks the pretense that is associated with good people carryout and the majority of these people associate themselves with religion, just like the main character, Grandmother.
The author uses Grandmother to represent the “good” people in the society whose vileness is coated by their religion as he tries to present the good versus the evil in his literary work. The grandmother grabs her extremely polished and coordinated travel attire before the Bailley family departs for a vacation in Florida, claiming that if they were to have an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know her as a lady. This implies that the grandmother is very obsessed with appearances above all. In this hypothetical accident, there are better and more important things she could worry about, like fearing lives of her grandchildren, her son Bailley and her daughter-in-law but she chooses to care more about strangers’ opinions of her. The grandmother is a character that has been used to depict how “good” people focus on their reputation instead of prioritizing sensitive issues.
Similarly, she begs The Misfit, still holding fast to her flimsy notions of “goodness”. She begs him not to shoot “a woman,” as if avoiding killing someone were simply a question of etiquette. She was reassuring him that she could tell he was “not a bit common,” as if morals and ancestry were somehow related. Even though he “is not the worst in the world either,” the Misfit is aware that he “is not a good man,” (Rea 249) thanks to his common sense. The grandmother’s goals are shown to be weak and shallow in the aftermath of the calamity, as her hat is the same. As Bailey is being led into the woods, the grandmother, according to O’Connor: As if she were accompanying him to the woods, reaches up to straighten her hat brim, but it falls off in her fingers (Rea 193). After pausing to look at it for a moment, she let it fall to the ground. She is now forced to hustle to find anything to replace the things she had thought significant because they are failing her and tumbling about her ineffectively.
The Misfit is first introduced to the grandmother as an idea at the beginning of the story. She only uses the newspaper accounts to try to get her way; she does not as noted actually think they will run into him. She does not actually imagine that they will have an accident or that she will pass away either; all she wants is to think of herself as the kind of woman, no matter what, whom people would instantly recognize. The grandma does not start to alter her values until she is faced with death.
The Misfit’s phrase, “She would have been a good woman […] if there had been someone there to shoot her every minute of her life,” is possibly O’Connor’s most famous quote (Antari 2020). On the one hand, this is a reproach to the grandma who thought she was always a “nice” person. On the other hand, it offers unmistakable proof that she was, for that one momentary insight in the end, righteous.
Another surprising fact is that when the grandmother tries to locate the idea of prayer when she is held at gunpoint, it nearly seems as though she has forgotten how to pray. Flanner claims that while she was chanting, “Jesus, Jesus,” which is code for “Jesus will help you,” it seemed as if she might be cursing. She has always thought of herself as a kind person, but it is a misfortune that her sense of goodness is based on superficial, materialistic ideals and that it even approaches evil (Rea 200). Although the Misfit openly rejects Jesus by saying, “I’m doing all right by myself,” his irritation with his own lack of faith (“It ain’t right I wasn’t there”) (Rea 250) suggests that he has given Jesus considerably more thought than the grandmother has.
Another noteworthy fact is that these “decent” people consistently prioritize saving their own lives over all else when they are put in difficult circumstances. When faced with mortality, the grandmother frequently lies, flatters, and begs. But as she finally reaches out to touch The Misfit, she utters some somewhat cryptic words, “Why you are one of my little ones. You belong to my own family!” It’s unclear what those lines mean, but it’s likely that they represent the grandma’s realization of how intertwined we are all. She might finally understand what The Misfit already knows, namely that everyone possesses both good and evil and that there is no such thing as “a good man”.
In conclusion, the Flannery O’Conner successfully passes his information that this “good” people end up engaging in much evilness much more than the immoral people. The grandmother is a very outstanding example of this person who is busy concentrating on their “goodness” and losing the morality part of it. Grandmother, who successfully associates herself with faith, does not rebuke the act of killing in the Misfit, finds it fit to save her own, and lies shamelessly, among other immoral acts.
Works Cited
Antari, Ni Luh Ade Ulan. “Semiotic Analysis on Flannery O’connor’s A Good Man is Hard to Find.” ULIL ALBAB: Jurnal Ilmiah Multidisiplin 1.10 (2022): 364-3372.
Rea, Robert. “Flannery O’Connor’s Murderous Imagination: Southern Ladyhood in” A Good Man Is Hard to Find”.” Southwest Review 102.2 (2017): 168-263.