A Good Man Is Hard To Find And Other Stories (1992) - Plot & Excerpts
I am developing quite an addiction for the Southern flavor of American literature, and reading my first short story collection by Flannery O'Connor is more than just adding fuel to the flame of my interest. She is surpassing all my expectations and constantly going beyond the surface of things to touch on personal trauma that is often as unavoidable, tragic and soul reaving as a Greek tragedy. I am not sure if I should use the term 'gothic' for her stories. Yes, her subjects are usually deformed people, people with dissabilities or with communications problems, people with anger in their hearts or living in denial of the outside world. A world that keeps intruding on their fictional reality, mercilessly knocking them down and teaching them some harsh lessons... or not, to those still unwilling to see or hear. I am associating Gothic with romantic heroes or heroines and grotesque settings. O'Connor's characters are ordinary people engaged in routine, everyday activities. Things get scary, yes, but I didn't find any supernatural elements or larger than life heroes. Unless you consider the stories through the lens of the author's Roman Catholic faith, which admittedly plays a central role in her plot construction. You have the sinners, the trial she or he has to go through, and the revelation of grace, or mercy, or whatever else you might want to call the lesson of the day. Literary, I found every story in the collection to be a true gem of style and restrained intensity, the raw emotion that I have so admired in Carson McCullers veiled here in a more intellectual and self-assured presentation that peals back from the soul every pretense and affectation to aim at the core of the character. There is a sustained sense of doom, of bleakness and hopelessness that can get depressing after a while, but more than one story ends on a more upbeat note, with life going on, and maybe a little more wisdom and kindness settling down on the afflicted, and on the reader. A Good Man Is Hard to Find is the opening gambit, and despite the title it is not about romantic searches for a suitable spouse. It is about a typical American family leaving on vacation, by car from Georgia to Florida I think. There's the working father, the housewife mother, two lively kids and a garrulous grandmother that is kind of annoying in her self-centered preoccupation. The outside world barges into their lives in the most brutal and unreasonable way, and I can't really think what the lesson is, other than to live life fully and meaningfully while we can, because it is so fragile and precious and easily wasted. The River is possible even more disturbing than the first story, because here, instead of an old lady, we have a young boy sent by his indifferent parents to spend the day with a babysitter. This lady takes the boy to a Baptist ceremony, and I believe the moral is we need to be very careful about what we teach our children and how we protect them from harm. The Life You Save May Be Your Own is one of the first stories to introduce the dynamics of a mother and daughter relationship, a recurrent theme in the collection. The first one protective, the other damaged and unable to face the world on its own. The messenger of change, or Fate, takes the form of a one-armed travelling handyman, who offers to fix the women's farm implements in exchange for food and lodging. The mother sees in him an opportunity to solve the worries about the future of her daughter, but the man may have plans of his own. One possible moral may be that from immoral and selfish actions may result positive outcomes, and that there is a streak of kindness and integrity even in the lost souls. A Stroke of Good Fortune is the story of another selfish woman, one of modest origins who tries to escape from the perceived prison of the cycle of marriage and children and taking care of the land and of the family, choosing instead a form of living for yourself. Her internal monologue takes place as she painfully climbs the stairs to her apartment. She's a gossippy and mean spirited woman, with an acid tongue ( "She had expected Rufus to have turned out into somebody with some get in him. Well, he had about as much get as a floor mop."), but she is not refused grace, even if the one that descends on her may be different from the one she has prayed for. But God (or the author) knows best. A Temple of the Holy Ghost is one of the few stories with a touch of humour, coming from a very smart young girl who receives the visit in her house of two older girls from a convent school. The title of the piece is a reference to the lesson taught in the convent that your body is a temple and you must treat it as such, not letting anybody (especially boys) touch it or disrespect it. The young witness/narrator is quick to dismiss the convent girls for their shallowness : "Neither of them could tell an intelligent thing and all their sentences began, 'You know this boy I know well one time he ...'" . But the story turns out to be not about the giggling adventures of these inept teenagers, but about a circus freak they see in town, and about accepting the other for what he is, not for what he looks like. This is also one of the stories where the Catholic viewpoint and the prayer as a way to salvation are made explicit. The Artificial Nigger is my favorite piece in the collection, the most powerful condemnation of prejudice and narrow minded clinging to traditions. It has also some of the most beautiful and evocative paragraphs. An old man lives alone with his grandson in an isolated farm: "Mr Head looked like an ancient child and Nelson like a miniature old man." . Mr. Head decides that in order to keep the boy by his side, he must scare him away from the big city, so they take a trip together to see all the niggers and the craziness of the metropolis. Crazy their adventure is, but also eye opening about the dark motives and the cruel methods the old man is willing to use in order to reach his goal. Ultimately, the couple turn their back on the modern world and its more permissive way of thinking, retreating to their hillbilly abode to lick their wounds and fight with each other. Yet there is hope still for the old man, even at this late stage in his life: "Mr Head stood very still and felt the action of mercy touch him again but this time he knew that there were no words in the world that could name it. He understood that it grew out of agony, which is not denied to any man and which is given in strange ways to children. He understood it was all a man could carry into death to give his Maker and he suddenly burned with shame that he had so little of it to take with him." A Circle in the Fire is about another mother with a reclusive / disabled daughter. This time, the authoritarian lady is hard working and very proud of her farm, while the daughter hides in an upper room (autistic?) and timidly looks at the world from a safe distance. The status-quo is broken by visitors from the city: three young boys from an impoverished neighborhood, dreaming of a land of plenty and a life of leisure. "You take a boy thirteen years old is equal in meanness to a man twice his age. It's no telling what he'll think up to do. You never know where he'll strike next." I could draw parallels between this story and the parable of Job, seeing as we are tested in our self-sufficiency and pride and judged not by the wealth we amass but by the compassion we show. A Late Encounter with the Enemy deals with one of the favorite Southern pastimes: glorifying the past, clinging to a false image of prosperity and gentility that was built on the backs of slavery and intransigence. Here an elderly lady is graduating at 64 from a college and wants her 104 years old grandfather to come and be on the stage as a symbol of Confederacy values: "See him! See him! My kin, all you upstarts! Glorious upright old man standing for the old traditions! Dignity! Honor! Courage! See him!" The old senile geezer is as fake as the General's uniform he wears, a gift from a television producer in need of fresh material for a feature. I would choose as soundtrack for this piece a Jethro Tull tune : "Living in the Past" Good Country People revisits the mother / daughter menage, with the particularity that the daughter here is only physically disabled (a missing leg from a traffic accident). Her mind is as sharp as scissors, at least in theory, as she holds a university degree in philosophy, one that is pretty much useless to her as she vegetates in her mother's house. Fate knocks on their door in the shape of a travelling Bible salesman, of good country origins, according to his own account. It goes to show that not even intelligence makes us proof against the vicissitudes of fate or sweet-tongued crooks. "Malebranche was right: we are not our own light. We are not our own light!" *exclaims the young lady in despair, finding philosophy an insufficently strong support in her time of need.*OK, so I didn't know who Malebranche is and I had to look it up, but it was worth it. It appears he was a French priest and philosopher from the 17 century who tried to reconcile the mind and the body, the will of God and causality in the real world. The Displaced Person ends the collection in grand style, opening out the enclosed and often retrograde Southern culture to the modern influences and upheavals brought about by the second world war. The protagonist is another strong lady, managing a big farm with the help of 'white trash' servants and former slaves as workers. A priest persuades her to accept a family of Polish refugees from the concentration camps, and the change seems beneficial in the beginning, as the new man introduces modern machines and a more rigorous work ethic. "Times are changing. Do you know what's happening to this world? It's swelling up. It's getting so full of people that only the smart thrifty energetic ones are going to survive." The old hands rebel against the changes, and the lady is torn between being faithful to her traditions and accepting the modern times. Tragedy once again tests the characters to their very core. Peacocks feature prominently in the background as a glittering but endangered symbol of the past glories. The story ends with the priest trying to give solace to the guilty conscience of the owner, and my own review ends with an ambiguous message of hope, one that requires a strong character who accepts all humanity's faults and still has the faith to go on: "We are all damned, but some of us have taken off our blindfolds and see that there's nothing to see. It's a kind of salvation." ---After the journey: I am now convinced that Flannery O'Connor knows not only how to write exceptional pages of literature, but she is well acquainted with all forms of physical and spiritual pain. Writing is a form of exorcising these demons, and possibly transmit the gift of grace to the reader. I am not a member of her confession, or ready to be converted, but I can respect and admire the results of her struggles.
I enjoy all kinds of writing. I like the simple, breezy writing that’s entertaining and takes very little effort to understand. I like the dense, loaded writing that takes weeks of thought and discussion to fully unpack. The remarkable thing about the writing of Flannery O’Connor is that it somehow seems to encompass that entire spectrum. Her writing is without a doubt easy to digest, but I would never in a million years call it simple. Reading her prose feels less like reading and more like having her thoughts and imagery mainlined into my brain with no translation necessary. And yet, she also packs a massive punch of history and depth into her stories – a depth of meaning that, for me, sometimes didn’t become fully apparent until I’d thought about these stories (and mostly about these characters) for days. She has this incredible, consummate control over her words that I’ve rarely (if ever) seen. She manages to be succinct, yet descriptive; bare, yet three-dimensional; meaningful in a fraction of the words it would take a lesser writer. Her characters are so three-dimensional it’s like they spring up in your head, fully alive. And oh boy, does she write some reprehensible characters. Never before has an author so quickly succeeded in making me not only hate her characters, but anticipate their downfall with a sort of sadistic glee. Her characters are good, upstanding country people who feel reassured by their habits and place in the world. And it’s oh so easy to sit on high and judge them for their willful ignorance – to feel holier, more worldly. Meanwhile, they’re feeling holier than everyone else in their community – set apart. But by the end, Flannery O’Connor shows you (more like punches you in the face with the fact) that the joke’s actually on you and her characters both. The world of Flannery O’Connor is a brutal, violent place where no one is ever safe or set apart – especially not her readers and ESPECIALLY not her characters.One of my favorite stories in this collection is Good Country People, about an upstanding southern mother and her thirty year old, “crippled” daughter who holds a Ph.D in philosophy but who still lives at home and is viewed as a child due to her condition:“Nothing is perfect. This was one of Mrs. Hopewell’s favorite sayings. Another was: that is life! And still another, the most important, was: well, other people have their opinions too. She would make these statements, usually at the table, in a tone of gentle insistence as if no one held them but her, and the large hulking Joy, whose constant outrage had obliterated every expression from her face, would stare just a little to the side of her, her eyes icy blue, with the look of someone who had achieved blindness by an act of will and means to keep it.”With that tiny paragraph, she says more about their relationship than I could ever say in any summary. The story follows Joy, (who has rechristened herself “Hulga” in an act of rebellion) as she decides to condescend to have a fling with a simple, travelling bible salesman, gets more than she bargained for, and stumbles over her own true core beliefs in the process. My other favorites were A Good Man is Hard to Find, A Stroke of Good Fortune, A Circle in the Fire, and The Displaced Person. (A couple of these are available for free online so I've linked to them here.)Narrator Marguerite Gavin is excellent as always. She nails all of the different Southern accents...and tackles more N-bombs than I'm guessing she's ever said in her entire life. I know there's been some claim that these stories are racist, but I would wholeheartedly disagree. Rather, these stories are about racism and about racist characters - one never gets the sense that Flannery O'Connor holds these beliefs herself or is complicit.Perfect Musical PairingTammy Wynette – Count Your Blessings (Instead of Sheep)This book is the muddy green of a baptismal river and the rusty brown of old blood…It’s the starched white of new handkerchiefs and the tattered yellow of a family bible…and it’s soundtrack is Tammy Wynette.Also seen at The Readventurer.
What do You think about A Good Man Is Hard To Find And Other Stories (1992)?
The last book I read was also a collection of short stories, but that is where the comparison stops. Each and every one of the stories in A Good Man is Hard to Find is a gem, masterfully polished and displayed by Ms. O'Connor.This is, I think, the third or fourth time I've read through this book, and I still can't decide what she thinks of the human experiment. On the one hand, she paints her characters with such exquisite detail, putting forth their quirks and foibles in such a way that you can't help but know that she's studied the world around her with tenderness and affection. On the other hand, however, having set these people up like bowling pins, she immediately proceeds to knock them down. She so completely shreds her characters, using their own beliefs and worldviews to tear them apart with an almost unimaginable caustic fury.I love this book. Ms. O'Connor's apocalyptic vision of an America whose destruction comes from the depths of its own soul rings painfully true. Every character in this book thinks he or she has found the good man of the book's title, and they all think that they are that man. If that isn't America in a nutshell, I don't know what is.
—Joseph
There is no writer like Flannery O'Connor. Her stories meander through mundane situations usually with characters who are not necessarily on the safe side of normal. It is only after you finish that you feel that discomforting feeling that you just read something that is overpowering your senses. In other words, Flannery O'Connor sneaks up on you. "A Good Man is Hard to Find" is easily the most known , and most powerful , of her stories. Yet all nine of these short stories are little saboteurs in their own way.
—Marvin
I have been stewing on this book all night...it was 1)terrific in every and 2)completely rotten in every way and 3)scary, scary, terrifying scary without trying too hard to be. O'Connor has said that she searches in the darkest, most hopeless little worlds for "god's grace" (or more specifically, "god's presence", be it dark or light). Seeing as I have no fear of the wrath of an angry god, why did this book affect me so deeply, leaving me with a stunned expression staring at a blank wall for several minutes after each little story had wrapped up? My only conclusion is that, aside from being hypnotized to terror by O'Connor's seductive prose, I must have some residual, albeit repressed fears of the religion instilled in me at a young age. Those "tales of terror" from the preacher's mouth must still rattle around in my subconscious from time to time, which would explain why the horror movies that have most scared me in my life have always centered on demons and damnation. I love a good zombie movie, but The Exorcist scared the "bejesus" out of me (so to speak), and still does to this very day. This is true despite the fact that I find the plot to 28 Days Later more feasible than that of Rosemary's Baby or any other demon bodysnatching devil takeover plot imaginable (I am far more logically afraid of "microscopic bad things" than "invisible bad things," I suppose). But I am rambling. Read this book! YOU WILL THANK ME! If I haven't peaked your interest, allow me to mention a few "buzz words" appropriate to this book: serial killer, drowning child, crooked preacher, arson, theft, country trash, unwanted pregnancy, insanity, depression, poverty, seduction, abandonment, missing limbs, prosthetic limbs, ignorance, betrayal, emotional breakdown, and total psychological meltdown. And MORE.
—Paquita Maria Sanchez
