Redemption In Flannery O Connor's Good Country People

“The writers, I do believe, who get the best and most lasting response from readers are the writers who offer a happy ending through moral development. By a happy ending, I do not mean mere fortunate events: a marriage, or a last-minute rescue from death; but some kind of spiritual reassessment or moral reconciliation, even with the self, even at death.” – Fay Weldon

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. Her final act towards the Misfit was not out of charity, but in attempt to save herself.

As human beings, most of us are born to judge others. We cannot control our minds from thinking immoral of our fellow creatures. Does that make humanity evil? Not necessarily. We all heard the quote; “Never judge a book by its cover”, but is it possible as a human to live by that?

Redemption is the act of being saved from acts of evil and sin. The debate of whether human nature is redeemable or not has been one to plaque religious scholars. In Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find”, this question continues in the interactions between the characters; the most notable being the Grandmother of a rather horrible family and the Misfit, a murderer. While on a road trip, these two characters’ paths collide and lead to a rather unfortunate end where the Grandmother and her family are killed. While many readers believe the ending creates and overall negative tone of the story, some believe that there is a hope for redemption; the story’s author O’Connor who is a devoted Catholic included. Even though human nature is flawed within Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”, there is a chance for redemption near the story’s ending.

In the novel, The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini tells the story of Amir, a young, Afghan boy who learns about what it means to be redeemed through the experiences he encounters in his life. The idea of redemption becomes a lesson for Amir when he is a witness to the tragic sexual assault of his childhood friend, Hassan. As a bystander in the moment, Amir determines what is more important: saving the life of his friend or running away for the safety of himself. In the end, Amir decides to flee, resulting in Amir having to live with the guilt of leaving Hassan behind to be assaulted. Hosseini shows us how Amir constantly deals with the remorse of the incident, but does not attempt to redeem himself until later in his life when Hassan has died.

Budge Wilson, in “The Metaphor,” writes about Ms. Hancock, a beloved teacher. Charlotte writes a metaphor in seventh grade relating her mother to a cold, grey building. When Wilson writes about Ms. Hancock, she describes her as being colorful and warm. Charlotte saw Ms. Hancock more as a mother figure than her own mother. However, when Ms. Hancock stops being her teacher, Charlotte starts to become more like her mother. Although, when Ms. Hancock dies, she breaks free of the hold of her mother and is “born” a new person. In the end, Charlotte realizes that adults can not see the beauty in people like Ms.Hancock, yet children can. Through juxtaposition, symbolism, and irony, Wilson describes Charlotte’s self-realization of life.

There are many things that factor into reasons for loving someone. Often times when people think of reasons for loving someone, they only think about the immediate motives. People do not consider reasons outside the obvious. However, there are many hidden motives that cause people t love one another. Flannery O’Connor’s “Good Country People” and William Shakespeare’s “My Mistress’ Eyes Are Nothing Like the Sun”, show that love can be influenced by an ulterior motive, through the use of specific word choice and storyline twists.

Symbolism is when the author uses objects to add deeper meaning to the story without mentioning it in the story. In Flannery O’Connor’s story, “Good Country People”, she uses symbolism to illustrate the antagonist and protagonist with more insight; for example, Manley’s hollow Bible signify how he really does not believe in Christianity, Hulga’s wooden leg portrayed her personality, and her name change represents how she is not the same girl she once was.

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

She yells at her mom saying “Woman! Do you ever look inside; do you ever look inside and see what you are not? God!” (O’Connor 375). Hulga is being very disrespectful to her mom and uses mean insults whenever she interacts with people she believes are inferior to her in intelligence and whenever she does not get her way. Her outbursts are never nice. She even changes her name from Joy to Hulga as a way of disappointing her mother.

In The Kite Runner, Khalid Hosseini writes that Amir makes mistakes, and because of that, it takes his entire life to redeem himself. Throughout The Kite Runner, Amir is looking for redemption. One of the reasons why Amir redeems himself was to fix the wrong he did to Hassan in his childhood. On the other hand, many may believe that Amir didn’t earn anything and rather wasted his time in Afghanistan. It might be thought that Amir did not revert his wrong to Hassan and did not redeem himself. Amir was able to do this in various ways throughout the book, especially towards the end. The Kite Runner by Khalid Hosseini shows that Amir is able to redeem himself from the wrong he did to Hassan by putting himself in danger to rescue Sohrab, by receiving a scar from the fight with Assef signifying his redemption, and finally by bringing Sohrab back to United States with him.

“The Red Convertible” by Louise Erdrich and “Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin both have the common theme of death; however, in “The Red Convertible”, the death of Henry ends the very close relationship that he has with his brother Lyman while in “Story of an Hour”, the death of Mr. Mallard marks an opportunity of independence and freedom for Mrs. Mallard which shows that the relationship between Mr. and Mrs. Mallard was unsatisfactory.

Holding a terrible truth that can lead to so much guilt can tear a person apart. Not only from themselves, but from others too. In the novel, The Kite Runner, there are many characters with many secrets that the others don’t know about. Two characters of many others are Amir and Rahim Khan. Amir is the main focus of the novel; it basically starts with his childhood all the way until he’s an adult. He was one of the most wealthy people in Afghanistan, until the Russian’s take over later on. His father, Baba, is very respected by others. Baba never paid much attention to his son, also his honesty with him was very poor. Therefore, Amir would spend most of his childhood with his servant, Hassan. Hassan is the reason Amir’s life changed forever, from

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. It’s a meeting that ends fatally for the family, but nonetheless changes two characters for the better. The main character, the grandmother, is displayed similarly to many other protagonists that O’Connor had written- selfish, rude, and vain. She and the murderer, called The Misfit, are both used to show that people can change with the help of God’s grace. Symbolism is also prevalent in

Helga Crane struggles with numerous forces, which include class and racial stereotypes, social expectations, and emotional baggage. The following article exploits her biggest struggle and the circumstances that would have made her more successful in pursuing happiness.