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Character Analysis by Hannah Martinez, Marissa Ibarra, and Elizabeth Trefzger

“A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor. Character Analysis by Hannah Martinez, Marissa Ibarra, and Elizabeth Trefzger. Plot Summary. A family goes on a vacation trip to Florida, taking their elderly grandmother with them.

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Character Analysis by Hannah Martinez, Marissa Ibarra, and Elizabeth Trefzger

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  1. “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor Character Analysisby Hannah Martinez, Marissa Ibarra, and Elizabeth Trefzger

  2. Plot Summary • A family goes on a vacation trip to Florida, taking their elderly grandmother with them. • The Grandmother goes rather against her will at first, since she has just read in the newspaper that an infamous serial killer, the Misfit, is recently at large and on the run from the Federal government. She tries to warn her family, but they blow her off. • They drive through their state on the way to Florida, and while they are on a dirt road in the middle of nowhere, they crash into a ditch and meet up the… The Misfit. • His two henchmen take the Grandmother’s family one or two at a time and kill them. She alternates between pleading with the Misfit, telling him he’s not a bad person, and talking to him about life and religion. • He finally shoots her but states that “she would have been a good woman… if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life” (236).

  3. Character Appearance • Old Grandmother • Old, thin, and veiny (228) • Bright brown eyes (229) • Snores loud enough to wake herself up (230) • Has a gray-striped cat names Pitty Sing (230) • Old-fashioned clothes (227) • Navy blue straw sailor hat with white violets • Navy blue dress with white polkadots • Perfect white organza collar and cuffs • Purple violet necklace with a sachet

  4. Speech • She’s so afraid of the Misfit at first that she can’t speak. (235) • She demands politeness and is embarrassed when others aren’t polite • “Aren’t you ashamed?” (229) • Her language shows her age • “In my time… children were more respectful of their native states and their parents and everything else. People did right then.” (228) • Her word choice is more cultured than some of the other characters, which indicates her old-fashioned upbringing in the South. • “What did you do to get sent to that penitentiary that first time?” (234)

  5. Environment • Time period: Mid-to-late 1950s • Setting: Atlanta, GA, a town called Timothy where the family stops to eat, and a dirt road in the middle of nowhere. • She was raised in Jasper, GA, and spent some of her youth in Tennessee. (228) • She tells them stories about her young life in Georgia, particularly about a man who courted her, and some of the landmarks she remembers. (228)

  6. Character Thought and Feelings • Very old-fashioned in her clothes (227), her manners (228), and her manner of reasoning with the Misfit, “I just know you’re a good man… You’re not a bit common” (233). She also shows her old-fashioned ways in using some unusual terms like when she refers to an African-American boy as a “pickaninny” (228). • She feels like times have changed drastically due to the ways children have become disrespectful (228). “People are certainly not nice like they used to be” (229). • She seems religious at the end when she is faced with death (234-236)… She tells the Misfit to pray (235) and says “’Jesus Jesus,’ meaning Jesus will help you, but the way she was saying it, it sounded as if she might be cursing.” (235)

  7. Relationships with Others • She is barely tolerated by her son and grandchildren; they see her as a mindless old woman who doesn’t know anything (227). Her grandchildren also ridicule her to her face (227). • She tries to be a mother figure to the Misfit (236). She sees him as one of her own wayward children, “Why you’re one of my babies. You’re one of my own children” (236).

  8. Claim • The grandmother in the story is a woman who enjoys being in control. She is a woman with an appearance of being a primped lady at all times. Her son and his family, with whom she lives, don’t really acknowledge her enough to respect her the way she demands respect. The character brings humor to the story and, at the same time, she serves as a timeline on how things have changed drastically through time. The ending of the story, when the Misfit is about to kill the old woman, she begins to plead with him. Her character of being a bold and forward person who feels that her way is the “right proper way,” changes to a humble person who at this point almost wants to nurture the Misfit in a motherly way. She softens drastically, and she loses her lady touch of control. Unfortunately, it is too late, and she is killed. This ending gives the reader a feeling that it’s better to evaluate one’s life before it’s too late.

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