Good Country People Critical Analysis

Flannery O’Connor expresses the theme of pride in her short stories, “Good Country People”, “The Life You Save May Be Your Own”, and “The Displaced Person”. Hulga Hopewell thinks she is above Manley Pointer and can out smart him. Mr. Shiftlet claims everyone else is slime and should b washed away when in reality it is him who is slime. Mrs. McIntyre watches a worker get killed to save herself the trouble of firing him.

O’Connor’s tone is overarchingly ironic, and this plays out in “Good Country People” by rebutting the idea that Manley Pointer is a wholesome religious

Flannery O’Connor’s Good Country People is a short story mostly centralized around a thirty-two year old woman named Joy. Joy works alongside her mother Mrs. Hopewell who owns a farm out in the boondocks of Georgia. Joy has a wooden leg due to a childhood accident. Joy has a strong belief in atheism and holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy. Due to the depressing life that Joy lives she finds that her name does not suit her characteristics whatsoever, she goes so far as to change her name to “Hulga”, a rather ugly name that her mother does not find very suitable. Joy tends to think very arrogantly in nearly every scenario she faces. She thinks she has a superior mind compared to everyone else. Her “superior mind” is tested when a bible salesman by the name of Manley Pointer shows up on Mrs. Hopewell’s door. Despite having no interest in purchasing bibles from Mr. Pointer, she still invites him in believing he is on of the “good country people” she is so fond of. As the bible salesman was he invites Joy to a picnic for the next day. Now Joy has never

Flannery O’Connor is a renowned Southern author, noted for her gothic works and heavily Catholic themes. She focuses predominantly on racial tensions, morality, and divine grace. The religious and moral themes of her short story, A Good Man is Hard to Find, converge on the character of the grandmother. Despite the self-proclamations of fulfilling what it means to be a Southern lady, Grandmother holds a superficial grasp of her religion. Throughout the story, the Grandmother never truly changed, only her ostensible actions did.

Flannery O’Connor’s stories always contain a flawed character that is usually crippled in a spiritual or a moral sense to embody an ongoing issue in her time through that flaw. In O’Connor’s story, “Good Country People,” the protagonist’s physical and spiritual flaws represent weaknesses in a certain movement that swept up the early-mid 20th Century: the movement of Nihilism. She invalidates Nihilism through Joy’s (who changed her name to Hulga) three physical imperfections and at her “moment of grace” in which she loses her artificial leg. Hulga has a weak heart, artificial leg, and slightly defective eyesight. While they are physical flaws, these symbolize “her emotional, intellectual, and spiritual impairments” (Oliver 234).

Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find” was published in 1955. O’Connor was also known for her novel The Violent Bear it Away (published in 1960) and her collection of short stories Everything That Rises Must Converge (published in 1964). The author often used violence and greed to show how she saw humanity that was without God. She liked to write about pettiness and vanity in the rural south, both of which play large parts in “A Good Man is Hard to Find.” This particular piece of work is about a family who goes on a road trip that takes an unexpected turn when they cross paths with a murderer and his henchmen.

This entailed that one needed to leave their pride at the door and recognize reality and limitations on ones self and not be overtaken by the temptations in life. If one hadn't left their pride at the curb, they were going to experience a rude awakening in Mrs. O’Conner’s short stories. The “Good Country People” had given us the extravagant and elegant Hulga, a girl who was just bursting with pride and self regard. Daughter of Mrs. Freeman, Hulga had thought she was better than everyone. But Hulga hadn't been so perfect, she not only had a heart condition that would slow her down on the farm she had been working on, but she had a wooden leg to delay her even more.

The story takes place at the height of the Civil Rights Movement in America, when desegregation is finally achieved. Flannery O’Connor’s use of setting augments the mood and deepens the context of the story. However, O’Connor’s method is subtle, often relying on connotation and implication to drive her point across. The story achieves its depressing mood mostly through the use of light and darkness in the setting.

While reading “Good Country People” there was something that really piqued my interest: Why did Hulga Hopewell agreed to date Manley Pointer? Before I get into that I want to talk about both Hulga and Manley separately. Hulga Hopewell is one out-of-the-ordinary character. Her named was “Joy” until she was 21 years old which is when she decided to change it from “Joy” to “Hulga” due to not living a very joyful life. She lost her leg when she was 9 after a hunting accident which cause her to have a hard time to get connected with people and lead her to have a bad attitude. She was told she has a weak heart when visiting a doctor with her mother and might live to see 45 if taken care of properly. Hulga has a Ph.D. degree in philosophy and is also

When comparing and contrasting the two short stories “A Good Man is Hard to Find” and “Revelation” written by Flannery O’Connor, many similarities are noticed between the main characters as well as many differences. The author of the short stories based them on rejection and redemption in the modern world and it is shown in both stories. The Grandmother and Mrs. Turpin are similar and opposite when comparing being selfish and hypocritical, as well the amount of grace in each character’s life’s. Both the grandmother from “A Good Man is Had to Find” and Mrs. Turpin from “Revelation” are selfish characters but show their selfishness in different ways.

Literary Analysis ENG2106 Student name: Li Michaela Bernice Student ID: 4002551 Word count: Grace and sins Flannery O’Connor was a Southern author from America who frequently wrote in a Southern Gothic style and depended vigorously on local settings and bizarre characters. Her works likewise mirrored her Roman Catholic faith and regularly examined questions of morality and ethics. She created violence in the end of both “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” and “Everything that Rises Must Converge” to put the stories to the end. She asserted that she has found that violence is strangely capable of returning her characters to reality and preparing them to accept their moment of grace, and also violence is the extreme situation that best reveals who

Characters serve as the metaphorical foundation upon which a story is written. In fact, the personalities of characters often reveal the outcome of a story’s plot before the author explicitly states it. In Flannery O’Connor’s short story “A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” the self-indulgent grandmother portrays the outcome of her attempted evangelism through her sanctimonious nature. Through her illegitimate Christian appearance based on deceit and self-elevation, her failed attempt to persuade the Misfit can be attributed to her hypocritical personality.

Throughout the history of American Literature, there have been hundreds of influential pieces which have left a mark on other writers. The book “In Honor of David Anderson Brooks, My Father” by Gwendolyn Brooks utilizes a unique writing style, theme and American values. This text was sharing her father’s story and personality to the reader before he passed away. He presumably lived alone and maintained his own home.

Deceptive people have a keen way of getting people to give in to their irresistible charisma. In the short story “Good Country People” by Flannery O’Connor, there is a character who shows the reader just how deceptive someone can be. The character’s name is Manley Porter, and he is the antagonist in the story. Throughout the short story Porter shows the reader how he is able to play with his victims. The victim he decides to play is a one legged girl name Hulga, and he shows the audience just what kind of person he truly is. After reading this story one will be warned of the dangers of deception by people who seem to be a good.

As you can see her stories are surrounded by her belief. In today’s world societal morals and values have drastically crumbled making the world an unacceptable place. Flannery O’Conner’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find” moves from a family comedy into a brutal revelation while on a family vacation. While on the way to find the homestead where grandmother grew up, she puts them down the wrong path right into a murderer’s escape route.