The Path of Salvation in Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find"

A detailed Summary of The Path of Salvation in Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find"

"If you were blind, you should have no sin: but now you say, we see; therefore your sin remains" (John 10:41) Flannery O'Conner explores the nature of sin and the path to in the relationship of The Misfit and the grandmother in her short story "A Good Man is Hard to Find."

O'Connor gives us in the grandmother and The Misfit two contrasting opportunities for salvation from sin. The grandmother dressed in her sunday best clothes "in case of an accident , anyone seeing her dead would know at once she was a lady," showed a lady more concerned with the appearance of her life to others rather than her salvation which thus far she had failed to consider. And shows the grandmother's shallow thoughts of death. In the grandmother's mind, her clothing preparations prevent any misgivings about her status as a lady. But as the Misfit later points out,"there never was a body that gave the undertaker a tip." The Misfit on the other hand has constructed his philosophy of violence around the lack of proof of Jesus and has walled himself in it rejecting any oportunity for salvation. The Misfit says of Jesus, "I wasn't there so I can't say He didn't..." and

re I would of known and I wouldn't be like I am now..." and so asks the most basic question as to the nature of sin and redemption. He has answered himself already by saying, "I don't want no hep... I'm doing all right by myself," when asked why he won't pray. The Misfit has rejected the glimpses of the divine and instead is intent on "killing somebody or burning down his house, or doing some other meanness to him." "The Misfit has a much deeper understanding of religion and his belief system than does the grandmother. O'Connor likens him to a prophet gone wrong... [he has] the potential for greatness but as the result of seeing mankind at their worse, [he has] become jaded to individual suffering" (McMillen). This philosophy is in sharp contrast to the grandmothers southern manners in which she has misplaced her faith. In asking The Misfit "You wouldn't shoot a lady, would you?" the grandmother has failed to see that her salvation depends not on The Misfits perception of h!

"Literary Analysis: 'A Good Man is Hard to Find' by William Brown"

"Research Brief of 'A Good Man is Hard to Find' by Erik Secker"

http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~daniel/amlit/reader/south/seckergood.html

Walters, Dorothy. Flannery O'Connor. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1973.

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Approximate Word count = 851
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English

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