The Journey in “a Good Man Is Hard to Find”
The Journey in “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” In the short story “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor, the grandmother searches for grace and redemption in a world full of sin, racism, and death and finds it through faith. This takes her on a journey that proves hard and difficult and one that leads her to the one good man, The Lord. On the journey, she has racist thoughts, is self-indulgent, and puts her trust in financial resources and social manners. It is not until the end of her life when she finally finds redemption and grace through faith in Jesus Christ. The story is set in the 1950’s, a time when the world was beginning to change. World War II had just ended and the Civil Rights Movement had begun. The perception of the south was beginning to evolve with these times, yet, the grandmother is lost in her own version of the south. The grandmother says, “‘In my time, children were more respectful of their native states and their parents and everything else’” (O’Connor 1146). In her time, she believes people did right by others and people treated everyone and everything fairly and respectfully. However, in her time, racial inequality was occurring, especially in the south. African-Americans were not being treated fairly or equally. The grandmother still exhibits this racism when she says, “‘Little niggers in the country don’t have things like we do’” (O’Connor 1146). She herself demonstrates the problems in the old south, and she fails to acknowledge that she does. She praises her own vision of the south that she sees as enduring. Choosing to perceive impoverished black children as picturesque, fantasizing about plantation homes, and reminiscing over gentlemen who call for her hand. She does not want to escape her self-indulgence and accept the fact of the south is changing. While she may not want to accept the fact, she does recognize the south is changing. She hints at this when saying, “‘People are certainly not nice like they used to
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