A Good Man is Hard to Find like Good Country People treats an encounter with a mysterious stranger --the difference is a hapless family in this tale ventures forth into the precarious world for a disastrous meeting --the story is intended to demonstrate the efficient operation of grace in extremity --on another level, the events suggest the disturbing possibility of a contrary interpretation.

Grandmother Bailey John Wesley June Starr The Misfit Fat Sammy

Grandma ignores the family and connives to get her way --she hides her cat in a hatbox and sneaks it in the car --her petty selfishness causes them to detour off the main road to search for the misplaced plantation --the cat escapes and causes Bailey to lose control and the car flips over. The murders (including the Misfit) materialize on the Horizon

Youre the Misfit!!! --The Grandmother seals the fate of the family when she blurts out her recognition of the Misfit --She pleads with him on religious grounds offers him money and clothing. The misfit participates willingly in the dialogue --two things bother the misfit; he does not remember his crime for which he is convicted. He is also distressed by Christs claims to have raised the dead

Why youre one of my babies. Youre one of my own children! In OConnors words this final impulse of selflessness in evidence that the old lady has been admitted to grace it is a free act, the acceptance of grace particularly that I always have my eye on as the thing which will make the story work. In the story, A Good Man is Hard to Find, it the Grandmothers recognition that the misfit is one of her children….

She wouldve been a good woman…if it had been somebody to shoot her every minute of her life. The Grandmothers final transcendence of self in her last moments is admirable… …death on such terms as she encounters seems a high price to pay for salvation In OConnors view, there is no place in the divine scheme for human imperfection …imperfect specimen deserve to be damned for his failings or blasted to salvation by a final insurgence of Grace.

Its no real pleasure in life. Even the Misfit renounces his earlier endorsement of evil- pleasure in his final statement His unremembered crime suggests the plight of all suffering humanity that is burdened with guilt for unremembered transgressions. The charge of murdering the father recalls both the crimes of Oedipus and the slaying of Christ The misfit identifies himself with Christ, who also thrown everything off balance.

It is evident that the Grandmothers pride can be uprooted only through violent means At the same time, she is unfairly subjected to excessive violence The wholesale slaughter of the grandmother and her family the chance meeting with the Misfit might well supports an amoral world view.

Pride Overthrown The downfall of heady conceit that suddenly its vulnerability t the unforeseen malevolence which assails the world Both Joy and the Grandmother are convinced of their inner capacity to deal with realityface the contingencies of life experience… …until they are suddenly confronted with forces more powerful than themselves.

…the instruction of pride through the lessons of humility is, in each story, the means by which the souls is prepared for its necessary illumination by the Holy Spirit