Flannery O'Connor is a master in the art of the short story. A Good Man is hard to find has become a classic and that controversial end scene which was depressing, cynical and hazing at the same time describes her work, unpredictable (O'Connor, and Frederick 31).
Biographical Information
She was born in the year 1925 on the twenty-fifth of March. She authored thirty two short stories and two novels. Apart from writing stories, she also wrote some commentaries and did some reviews. Thomas Aquinas and William Faulkner are some of the people she credits with inspiring her work. O’Conner used her wit in writing to blend various quotes to her mainstream philosophical notes; indeed her writings had these philosophical quotes. She lost her father to disease as a teenager. Flannery had no brothers or sisters. She was a strong apologist for Roman Catholicism. Funny enough she grew up as a Roman Catholic. She died on the third of August 1964.
Literary Elements
Flannery O’Connor uses various literary elements in order to invoke the plot and the theme of her story. There is wide use of irony in this story, and the author capitalize on this style in order to invoke humor to the audience, and to also act a fulfillment of the literary elements in such novels. The use of situational irony is evident when the grandmother goes looking for a wrong house, and within the wrong state. This confusion rages one when the grandmother is embroiled by the perception that Misfit is saved, while Misfit on the hand, Misfit has a preconceived perception that the grandmother is not saved (O'Connor, and Frederick 3). These are situation ironies in which the author invokes to generate humor into the story. Symbolisms have equally mainstreamed this story. One element of symbolism is the Grandmother’s Hat. The heart is symbolic of misguided moral code since the grandmother swears that the hat is a significance of her feminist status. Finally, the author uses various motifs in this story. The use of nostalgia is a kind of motif, and it is manifest where grandmother, Red Sammy and Misfit recount the past moment and hold a belief that “good man” was easier to meet and come by in the past, but not in the present times.
Theme
The main theme refers to the Elusive Definition of a “Good Man”. This theme is critical since it mainstreams the novel. For example, the grandmother was accustomed to applying this term indiscriminately, just until it lost meaning. This implies that the term “good man” was applied illusively on characters in the novel.
VI. Conclusion
It was interesting to note that despite the author’s social intrigues, she rose to become one of the most celebrated writers of the time. She had no brothers, and she was brought up amidst religious controversies, but these circumstances only proved to propel her to her destiny of becoming a legendry writer of the time.
Works Cited
O'Connor, Flannery, and Frederick Asals. A Good Man Is Hard to Find. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1993. Print.
