Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find"

Having never read A Good Man Is Hard to Find before, the experience was bittersweet- the rare pleasure of discovering a masterpiece for the first time, but regret that I hadn't read it decades ago... I can't recall being so impacted emotionally by a dark twist of plot since reading Shirley Jackson's The Lottery, which I was reminded of as the grandmother begins realizing the tragic fate for her family. Despite that similarity, this Southern horror story creates a world of its own, and it's haunting. To read the author's analysis does, as the prompt suggests, "shed some light" on the story- but there are plenty of dark corners remaining that the reader must explore alone.

     The first surprising quote from O'Connor is her belief that "like the Greeks you should know what is going to happen... so that any element of suspense... will be transferred... from surface to interior" (Charters 1046). I disagree. It would not have been nearly as exciting to read this story initially if I had already known the ending. The subtle foreshadowing and the slow realization that something bad is brewing were the highlights for me. Yes, a reader can appreciate some elements more when they know where a story is going, but that is what second and further readings are for. An example: I picked up right away on the odd choice of names for the grandson, John Wesley. I saw it as an allusion to John Wesley Hardin, the Old West outlaw and murderer. That detail, combined with the grandmother's worries about The Misfit, and the grandchildren's disdain for her- I began imagining some approaching conflict between grandmother and grandson. I saw it as a good use of misdirection, a plot device to make the reader more vulnerable when the real climax comes.

     The lesson I learned most from O'Connor's interpretation is that author and reader do not have to agree on meaning. An artistic creation has a life of its own. O'Connor sees the grandmother in the crucial scene and gesture from a Christian perspective- "the most significant position life offers the Christian. She is facing death" (1047). I sympathized with the grandmother's naive attempts to solve the crisis through prayer; I can envision both of my own grandmothers doing the same. But as a non-Christian, I merely saw the futility of it all. I have a more Zen Buddhist outlook on things. Knowing my murder was imminent, I would have been silent- giving The Misfit nothing.

     As to the latter, I am the most mystified by O'Connor's view of The Misfit as "the prophet he was meant to become" (1048). The philosophical musings he gives on Jesus, as the story closes, lend a creepy sort of irony. But he fails miserably under my definition of "prophet". I loved the story, and know I'll read it again. Thank you, Ms. O'Connor, whether I see it your way or not.

Charters, Ann, ed. The Story and Its Writer: An Introduction to Short Fiction. Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2011. Print.