Essay Two: Compare and Contrast

Darcy Smittenaar

Ms. Holton

EN216-ONL1

May 5, 2013

Flannery O’Connor Revealing Southern American Dream

Both the grandmother from Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” and Mrs. Turpin from “Revelation” by the same author, experience the same epiphany: that all men, women and children are the same in the eyes of God.  Through somewhat comical depictions of these two southern women, O’Connor shows that the old ways of the south, with its “men of delicate fancy, urbane instinct and aristocratic manner” as well as the “New South” with its pretenders and fakes, are better left in the past (Southern).

In both stories, the protagonist’s appearance is subtly mocked by description.  The grandmother in “A Good Man is Hard to Find” wears white cotton gloves on a family road trip, meticulously places her purse in the car, and pins “a purple spray of cloth violets containing a sachet” in the hope that “anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady” (Good Man 679).  The grandmother is so concerned about how she appears to the rest of her small world, that she thinks nothing of the practicality of her attire.  Road trips are not neat and tidy, and the grandmother would have been better served wearing an outfit which would not be easily damaged or suffer overmuch from soiling instead of dressing up like the lady she thinks she is.  Mrs. Turpin is also derided in imagery.  She is described as “very large,” and she looms over the magazine table in the doctor’s waiting room.  Flannery also ironically calls her a “living demonstration that the room was inadequate and ridiculous,” indicating that Mrs. Turpin herself, with her “little bright black eyes” is in fact the inadequate and ridiculous one (Revelation 689).  Flannery O’Connors descriptions of both the grandmother in “A Good Man is Hard to Find and Mrs. Turpin in “Revelation” show how ridiculous anyone with the same mindset as these two fictional characters really is.

In their interactions with other characters, the protagonists in O’Connor’s two short stories show that the generations of southern Americans they represent are incorrect in their self-perceived superiority.  The grandmother heckles her family, insisting on taking a vacation to Tennessee when the majority of the others want to go to Florida, and refuses to leave her cat at home (Good Man 678).  When Red Sam’s wife repeatedly comments on how “cute” June Star is, instead of agreeing with the sentiment, the grandmother asks, “Aren’t you ashamed” (Good Man 681), as though paying someone a compliment was a bad thing.  So too, Mrs. Turpin’s interactions with the other characters in the waiting room shows her generation’s flaws.  Like the grandmother and her racist cooing over the negro boy (Good Man 679), Mrs. Turpin shows a decided bent toward racism as well.  Through Mrs. Turpin’s comments to the other characters in the beginning, as well as her thoughts to herself, O’Connor illustrates attitudes in the southern states which need to change.

Another way in which O’Connor mocks southern society and demonstrates a need for change is through the belief systems of the protagonists in both “A Good Man is Hard to Find” and “Revelation.”  The grandmother demonstrates a “superior moral attitude” when she interacts with The Misfit (Short Stories), imploring him to “pray, pray” (Good Man 686), and constantly telling him that “Jesus would help [him]” (Good Man 687), even though he does not want help—does not want to change.  Mrs. Turpin’s high-handed beliefs are similar.  She is constantly thanking Jesus that she was not born black or “white trash” or ugly (Revelation 692), only the first of which is anything more than her opinion about herself.  In another’s eyes, Mrs. Turpin might very well be ugly, or she may be white trash.  Either way, she believes that she is superior to certain people because Jesus made her what she is, and not anyone in the three categories of people she does not like.  She is also a hypocrite of the first order, showing one face to the negro farm hands who work for her and her husband while swearing she will never be friends with them to the woman in the doctor’s waiting room (Revelation 694).  Through Mrs. Turpin’s and the grandmother’s spoken beliefs, O’Connor shows that the people of the south need to change.

The final way in which O’Connor criticizes the ways of the south is through the epiphanies that the grandmother and Mrs. Turpin experience.  The grandmother realizes that The Misfit is like one of her own children, and Mrs. Turpin has a vision in which all people—even those in her hated categories—eventually go to Heaven (Good Man 688, Revelation 703).  Through her mildly mocking depictions of the grandmother in “A Good Man is Hard to Find” and Mrs. Turpin in “Revelation, Flannery O’Connor shows that the people in southern America need to become more tolerant.

 

Works Cited

"A Good Man Is Hard to Find." Short Stories for Students. Ed. Kathleen Wilson. Vol. 2. Detroit: Gale, 1997. 97-114. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 5 May 2013.

O'Connor, Flannery. "A Good Man Is Hard to Find." The Art of the Short Story. By Dana Gioia and R. S. Gwynn. New York: Pearson Longman, 2006. 678-89. Print.

O'Connor, Flannery. "Revelation." The Art of the Short Story. By Dana Gioia and R. S. Gwynn. New York: Pearson Longman, 2006. 678-89. Print.

"The Southern American Dream." Literary Themes for Students: The American Dream. Ed. Anne Marie Hacht. Vol. 2. Detroit: Gale, 2007. 586-592. Literary Themes for Students. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 5 May 2013.