Blog 3: Questions 2 & 5

Blog 3: Question 2
3. Discuss the title of “A Good Man is Hard to Find” – how does it relate to the story? Does this title provide a particular kind of insight into the text?:
The title “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” intrigued me before I read the story. I thought of what themes the author, Flannery O’Connor, would use to interpret the title in the story. To be honest, I would have never guessed that the story I read was about a family with a witty grandmother going on vacation and ended up being shot and killed by a wanted fugitive.
After reading the story, I now understand what O’Connor meant when she gave it the title “A Good Man is Hard to Find.” The title is mentioned throughout the story and with the intention to give the reader the understanding that no matter how much good someone does in this world, there is always someone else out there to balance it with evil. The first time the title is mentioned is when the family and the grandmother are stopped at a restaurant called The Tower just outside of a place called Timothy. The grandmother is making conversation with the owner, Red Sammy, and mentions that “People are certainly not nice like they used to be,” (O’Connor 1254). Red Sammy then begins to tell grandmother about how two men told Red Sammy that they worked at the mill. Red Sammy trusted them and he let the two men charge the gas they bought. However, because of the trust, Red Sammy was out the money it cost for the gas they took. Grandmother told Red Sammy that he was good man and that is why he allowed the men to charge the gas.
Next, as the family traveled on with their vacation, grandmother influenced the children to make a pit stop at an old house that she had once lived in. While the family was traveling on the road, they got into a horrible car accident. In the accident their car had flipped over twice, the mother and baby were tossed out the car, and the grandmother was tossed from the back to the front. The car needed to be towed, so the family waited for a car to pass by to ask for help. The car that passed by was being driven by a fugitive, The Misfit, and once he got out, grandmother recognized him. As The Misfit was talking with grandmother, his mannerism were that of someone who held respect for others as he was using words like: “no ma’am,” “yes ma’am,” and speaking with a kind and caring tone towards the mother, children, and especially the grandmother. As it turned out, even though The Misfit was telling his two men to take each family member back in the woods to shoot and kill them, the conversation he was making with the grandmother continued to possess kindness. Finally, when all the family was shot and killed, the grandmother was left with The Misfit to plea to him that he was a good man, “You’ve got good blood? I know you wouldn’t shoot a lady! I know you come from nice people! Pray! Jesus, you ought not to shoot a lady,” (O’Connor 1261). Even though The Misfit came from a good home, he still ended up a criminal. What intrigued me the most about the story, is when The Misfit explains to the grandmother why he calls himself The Misfit. Explaining that the punishment he has endured is much too harsh for the crimes he has committed. I believe The Misfit has an understanding that has been punished too severely for the crimes has committed, that somehow he has allotted him some leeway to commit more crimes.
The insight the title brings, is questions. Before I read the story, I thought up many different ways the story could go. Knowing that Flannery O’Connor was a well known author, I knew that there just had to be something intriguing about the story. That it was not just another love story about a man that has done wrong somehow and he tries to prove himself to be a “good man.” In my opinion, it is a mixture of both the intriguing title and the infamous author.

Blog 3: Question 5
5. How did/does Martha Stephens’ reading of “A Good Man is Hard to Find” (From The Question of Flannery O’Connor influence your own reading and understanding of the story? What did you make of/presume about the story before reading any criticism?
Martha Stevens influenced me by pointing out many comparisons that the family and the grandmother have when alive and then how they died. Stephens points out that O’Connor does not go into much detail about the family when they are alive and even when they are shot to death. O’Connor gives the reader enough information about the family that is needed, and even with that it revolves around how the grandmother is portrayed in the story. Stephens points out that the main event in the story is not the horrible act of the The Misfit and his two men killing the family in cold blood, but it is about the conversation that the grandmother has with The Misfit as they family is being killed.
I read the story before I read Martha Stephens’ “From The Question of Flannery O’Connor,” and I realized that I did not pay that close attention to the conversation between The Misfit and the grandmother as I was distracted by the family being killed without mercy. I was hoping the entire time I was reading “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” that the family was not being killed and that somehow the other two men were just trying to scare the grandmother. But my hope is quickly put to an end after realizing that the grandmother is also shot and killed.
Stephens helped me to further understand the meaning that O’Connor was trying to make by pointing out that the little things I missed were meant to have substantial meaning. For example, at the end of the story The Misfit makes the statement, “She would have been a good woman, if it had been somebody to shoot her every minute of her life.” I did not take this into account of the significant meaning it truly had until Stephens commented on that line. I now have an understanding of The Misfit meant. While The Misfit had the gun on the grandmother, her demeanor had changed in a way that if she would have acted like that her entire life, as if someone had a gun to her head, she would have been a good woman. I do not necessarily agree with it but that is what I believe O’Connor had meant when writing the story.