Influence of the Grandmother Character in A Good Man is Hard to Find

The story line of Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find" is largely dependent upon the characterization of the grandmother in the story. The success of the grandmother's characterization, in turn, is largely dependent upon the expression of her aristocratic, "old South" worldview. O'Connor does an exceptional job of expressing this worldview through the dialogue of the grandmother and through the way that she acts and dresses throughout the story.

In terms of dialogue, the grandmother's worldview is expressed explicitly on multiple occasions. One of these is near the beginning of the story, when in the car at the start of the family trip John Wesley says how he wants to drive through Georgia fast so he won't have to see too much of it. The grandmother replies, "In my time, children were more respectful of their native states and their parents and everything else. People did right then." This demonstrates her view of the "old South" in that she says in her time (in the "old South," presumably) things were different. Her tone and the way that she states it implies that it was somehow better then.

The grandmother goes on to demonstrate her "old South" view of things even further just afterward when she says, regarding a black child standing in the door of a shack they pass, "Oh look at the cute little pickaninny!" This situation is expounded upon after June Star remarks that the child had no "britches" on, and the grandmother replies, "He probably didn't have any. Little niggers in the country don't have things like we do. If I could paint, I'd paint that picture." Aside from the obvious use of the word 'nigger,' the grandmother's "old South" world-view is exposed through her conviction that the child wasn't wearing pants because he probably didn't have any. Why does she think this? Because the child was black. Also, the grandmother's aristocratic views come out in the last sentence of the quote. She'd just finished saying that black children in the country don't have things like the family does, a statement that you would think would conjure up a kind of sympathy of some sort. Rather, the grandmother simply says she'd like to paint a picture of the scene.

This lack of compassion toward the less fortunate, particularly of Southern blacks at the time, would have been a definitive characteristic of the "old South." The grandmother further defines her point of view soon after, referring to an old graveyard that "belonged to the plantation" and by making a joking reference to the movie "Gone With the Wind," both references containing key elements that are explicitly "old South."

The way the grandmother acts in the story also supports this aristocratic, "old South" worldview. When June Star acts up at Red Sammy's and talks back to Red Sam's wife, the grandmother is horrified and hisses to June Star, "Aren't you ashamed?" In her day a young lady would never have acted like that. Later, O'Connor writes, regarding the conversation between Red Sam and the grandmother, that "He and the grandmother discussed better times. The old lady said that in her opinion Europe was entirely to blame for the way things were now." The grandmother believes things were better back in her day - kids more respectful, people more trustworthy. It is interesting to see how she blames Europe for "the way things were now."

After leaving Red Sammy's place, the grandmother dozes in and out of cat naps, and at one point wakes up to a memory of "an old plantation that she had visited in this neighborhood once when she was a young lady." This fully supports the idea that the grandmother is of aristocratic, "old South" stock, in that of all the memories she could wake up to, she wakes up to one of a plantation she visited as a young lady. Even at the end (of the story and of her life) the grandmother displays her way of seeing things. A lady through and through, when confronted with The Misfit for the first time she says, "You wouldn't shoot a lady, would you?" After which she proceeds to remove "a clean handkerchief from her cuff to slap at her eyes with it."

The grandmother, when faced with a seemingly impossible and life-threatening situation, reverts back to her aristocratic, "old South" ways, trying to talk and cry her way out of it. After all, in her day no decent man would shoot "a lady." She goes on to try and flatter The Misfit, once more exposing her aristocratic view of things, saying, "I know you're a good man. You don't look a bit like you have common blood. I know you must come from nice people!" As if using the term "common blood" weren't an aristocratic enough adjective, the grandmother goes on to equate that not having "common blood" must mean that The Misfit is a "good man" who comes from "nice people," inferring that people of "common blood" must not be good men, and must not come from nice people. This is a stereotypical viewpoint commonly inherent in the aristocratic, "old South" view of things.

Lastly, the grandmother's dress is another factor characterizing her as holding aristocratic, "old South" views. Not only does she have a clean handkerchief stuffed up her "cuff" with which to "slap her eyes" once she's encountered The Misfit, but she's also wearing a hat. Even after being in a car accident which rolled the vehicle completely around in a full rotation, the grandmother proceeds to wear the hat as a lady. When her son is finally about to be led off into the woods to his death, the grandmother simply reaches "up to adjust her hat brim." Her son is about to die, and yet the woman still believes the important thing is to retain the lady-like posture of her hat.

Earlier on, at the beginning of the story, the grandmother's outfit is described more fully. She is said to be wearing "a navy blue straw sailor hat with a bunch of white violets on the brim and a navy blue dress with a small white dot in the print. Her collars and cuffs were white organdy trimmed with lace and at her neckline she had pinned a purple spray of cloth violets containing a sachet. In case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady." Though her outfit in itself is not explicitly or uniquely aristocratic or typically "old South," the idea that one finding her dead on the highway would see her as being a lady because of some "cloth violets" at her neckline is. Also are the "white cotton gloves" that she removes at the beginning of the drive.

The grandmother in O'Connor's story makes the story the powerful tale that it is. She begins the story, being referred to in the first sentence, and she ends the story by being both the cause of the conflict and the last of the family to die in the resolution of that conflict. Yet without O'Connor's vivid characterization of the grandmother's aristocratic, "old South" world-view, the story would not be nearly as powerful or shocking. The seeming innocence in the grandmother's words and actions is really a selfish type of ignorance, and O'Connor uses this to bring the story to perfection. Through the grandmother's dialogue, actions and dress, the audience is given a clearer picture of the world as she sees it, and thus O'Connor's story takes on a more personal and powerful air.

Sources

"A Good Man is Hard to Find." Wikipedia. 1 April 2008 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Good_Man_is_Hard_to_Find.

Davie, Patrick. "Short Story Reviews: A Good Man is Hard to Find." A Student's Guide to Flannery O'Connor. 1 April 2008 http://www.geocities.com/athens/troy/2188/ssreviews.html.

O'Connor, Flannery. "A Good Man is Hard to Find." A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories. 1955. New York: Harcourt, 1992.