The Concepts Of Good And Evil In Good Man Is Hard To Find

Hypocrisy is the disease of this era. Most people wear the masks of love, purity, and goodness, yet from inside they hide the complete opposite feelings, hatred, selfishness, and dishonesty. In the '' A good Man is Hard to Find '' this reality can clearly seen through the main character's behavior, the grandmother, who in the beginning of the story pretended to be curious about the life of her grandchildren, whereas, she herself, in the end of the story, begged The Misfit to keep her alive though all members of her family were killed. The thing that I like most about this story and make choose it is that it reflects the reality of this present life. Perhaps in this story the writer is trying to indicate that a good man is not hard to find but to distinguish. 

The general scene of the story is set in the Southern rural region of the United States. The family's house, where Bailey's family and his mother used to live in Atlanta, was the starting point of the incidents of the story. Thereafter, they headed towards the destination of their journey, Florida, using the car as a transportation device. Along the way, they could enjoy themselves watching some beautiful sights out of the window like, for example. ''the brilliant red clays blanks slightly streaked with purple, and the various crops that made rows of green lace-work on the ground. '' (O' Connor, p2, 1953) One more example of the sights which they have seen during their journey was a graveyard. '' look at the graveyard, the grandmother said. '' (O' Connor, p3, 1953)The sight of the graveyard could be considered as a foreshadowing to indicate to death, which the members of the family will face in the end of the story. Since the number of the graves, six, was equal to the number of the family. In their way, they stopped at The Tower for barbecued sandwiches, run by a man called Red Sammu Butt, where they could take a break and had their lunch. 

“The second half of the story takes place in the ditch in the middle of nowhere where the family lands after running off the dirt road. The ditch is described as about ten feet below the road, and lies between the road and a tall, dark and deep forest. ” (Shampoo Editorial Team, 2008) ''The road was about ten feet above and they could see only the tops of the trees on the other side of it. Behind the ditch they were sitting in ther were more woods, tall and dark and deep'' (O' Connor, p7, 1953) “This part of the story is like a staged play:the site of the action does not move. The ditch is the stage and the forest is the ''backstage'' where the characters are taken. We only learn what is going to happen from the noises we hear (usually screams or gunshots). ” (Shampoo Editorial Team, 2008). 

The story is full of physical objects mentioned by the writer to convey significant messages to the reader's mind for a deeper understanding of the story. The most important one is the car which may symbolize to the journey of life which each one of us goes through, and always ends with death like what happened with the family. Another example of the physical objects is the clothes which the grandmother has chosen to wear. The manner the grandmother wears helps us infer a part of her character. She likes to appear as a lady who belongs to high class people. ''Her collars and cuffs were white organdy trimmed with lace and at her neckline she had pinned a purple spray of cloth violets containing a sachet. In case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady. ''(O' Connor, p2, 1953)

Concerning the time of the story, the epoch of the story was never explicitly clarified. However, some hints were mentioned in the story which could help us inferring it. One of these hints is, for example, using the car as a transportation device at that time. Another one is that the grandmother mentioned the novel Gone with the Wind, “published as a book in 1936 and released as a movie in 1939. Since O' Conner wrote this story in 1953, it could be assumed from these two hints that the story could take place in the late 40' s or early 50' s” (Shampoo Editorial Team, 2008). If we have a quick glance at this sentence, ''They drove again into the hot afternoon'' (O' Connor, p5, 1953) Describing the afternoon as being hot, we can infer that the story took place in summer. 

With regard the time of the story in the micro level, “the story lasted for more than one day, and the family's journey began in the morning. ''The next morning the grandmother was the first one in the car'' (O' Connor, p1, 1953) However, it was not known for us at what time of the day the family had the accident and got stuck in the ditch where the climax of the story began. (Shampoo Editorial Team, 2008)

Moving to the third element of the setting, the social environment of the characters, both the protagonist, the grandmother, and the antagonist, The Misfit, have religious backgrounds. The grandmother uses references to religion when she interacts with her family's members even with the Misfit. ''pray, pray '' On the contrary, Misfit could be seen as the representative of anti christ. In addition, the grandmother's religious background helps us infer a side of her character as a hypocritical woman. She requests The Misfit to pray, whereas, she herself does not believe in that '' ''Jesus. Jesus, '' meaning, Jesus will help you, but the way she was saying it, it sounded as if she might be cursing. '' (O' Connor, p11, 1953)

“The story has a looming sense of darkness, anxiety, fear, danger and foreboding. ” (Shampoo Editorial Team, 2008, p3) An example of foreboding is when the grandmother was speaking with the owner of the restaurant and his wife. '' I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't attact this place right here''(O' Connor, p4, 1953) Concerning the sense of fear, when the family met with The Misfit and his men, they all became scared and terrified to death to extent that Bailey, the grandmother's son, could not stand on his feet when he was asked to accompany The Misfit's men, Bobby Lee and Hiram, towards the woods. Even the expression of his face reflected his deep feelings of fear and horror which he had. ''His eyes were as blue and intense as the parrots in his shirt and he remained perfectly still. ''(O' Connor, p9, 1953)