Analysis of A Good Man is Hard to Find essays

Analysis of A Good Man is Hard to Find essays Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find" is character driven. First, she introduces the characters in a way that allows the reader to see and understand the character. Yet her use of characterization is more than introducing the character to the reader. She effectively uses her characters to symbolize truth, the human problem which is universal. Through characterization she gives her work vitality, allowing the work to take on a life of its own. In "A Good Man is Hard to Find," O'Connor gives the role of symbolizing truth and the role of adding vitality to the piece through the use of the main character of the story, the grandmother. Flannery O'Connor's characters in "A Good Man is Hard to Find" are amusing and typical of the rural South. However the characters are shallow and seem void of any sort of spirituality. She describes the characters in her stories as "poor, afflicted in both mind and body, [with] little-or at best a distorted sense of spiritual purpose" (Polter). Besides using characterization as metaphors to other things, she successfully uses the technique to make readers feel as if they are in the same room with the person. Her descriptions are not flowery and are woven into the story at the precise point where a trait or physical description should be made known to the reader. She also uses other characters to help paint a picture Examples of characterization of the grandmother that gives the readers a firm view of the person begins in the first sentence of the story, O'Connor introduces the grandmother with, "the grandmother didn't want to go to Florida. She wanted to visit some of her connections in Tennessee. . ." (O'Connor 117). From this passage, O'Connor is introducing her readers to a woman who tries to control the family, but does not. O'Connor also describes the grandmother in the first paragraph though use of dialog. Readers immedi...