Category: Good Country People

Introduction

Flannery OConnor is one of Americas favorite writers thanks to her deep insightfulness and strength in writing unconventional with a touch of the gothic strange in them, such as shes done in her short story Good Country People.

The brief plot of the story

In this story, a small household gets a visit from a young door-to-door Bible salesman. One of these women is Hulga Hopewell, who is 32 years old, feels herself ugly beyond belief, has earned a Ph.D. in philosophy and must wear a false leg because her natural leg had been shot off in an accident when she was a child. While her mother invites the salesman in and considers him good country people like she is, Hulga does not believe in anything and thinks to seduce this young man when he shows the slightest interest in her. She is a flawed character who identifies herself only through her physical deformities, her glasses and her artificial leg, but remains ignorant of self until she is forced to confront the truth.

Although Hulga is well into her thirties, OConnor presents her as having very little in the way of worldly experience. Because she has a Ph.D., Hulga believes she is much more experienced and worldly than those with whom her mother associates, but she continues living with her mother and isolates herself from the rest of society. She is grotesque because of her missing leg and her emphasis upon it through her heavy step and clumping movements. Deformed characters are relatively few, and their general meaning fairly consistent: their conditions reflect spiritual incompleteness or lameness & each is in some way a moral derelict (Martin, 2001, p.88).

Hulgas flaw is in her spirit as represented by the physical deformity. She is led into her ruination at the hands of Manley Pointer, thinking she is instead leading him into temptation. During the night, she imagined that she seduced him. She imagined that the two of them walked on the place until they came to the storage barn beyond the two back fields and there & she had to reckon with his remorse (OConnor, 1990, p. 284). She feels powerful because of the fascination the salesman seems to feel for her.

Hulgas sense of identity is tied to her handicap and this handicaps her even further as it provides the opportunity for strangers to take advantage of her. When Hulga relinquishes her leg to the Bible salesman, she felt entirely dependent on him.

Her brain seemed to have stopped thinking altogether and to be about some other function that it was not very good at (OConnor, 1990, p. 289). In taking her leg, the Bible salesman has taken her very identity, the one thing with which she associates herself with completely. She has been robbed of her entire self: her intellectuality, her body, and her soul (Martin, 1969, p. 77). Despite her insistence on loathing the false leg and the thick glasses she depends on to see, in the end, Hulga finds she is literally left without a leg to stand on and is totally incapable of saving herself from her present situation.

Conclusion

Although it seems she will never experience the sort of power or trust she presumed to have with the Bible salesman again, Hulga is provided with a small measure of hope at the end. Her innocence is stolen from her as she is left in the barn minus her glasses and her wooden leg, yet she is given an opportunity to achieve grace through the understanding of her own limitations. If she learns she has value apart from her false leg and false eyes, she may find some means of also finding the kind of happiness she has believed cant be obtained.

Works Cited

Martin, Carter W. OConnors Use of the Grotesque. Readings on Flannery OConnor. San Diego, CA: Greenhaven Press, 2001.

OConnor, Flannery. Good Country People. The Complete Stories. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1990, pp. 271-91.

Good Country People by Flannery OConnor is a story that is full of irony and this irony is achieved by means of the main character, Mrs. Freeman. Moreover, the very title of the story gives the effect of irony. After reading the story, it becomes understandable what the title means in reality and how fully it supports the ironic contest of the story.

The irony of the story is introduced by Hulga Hopewells attitude to life, being more specific to her faith and pride. As it is seen from the reading, Hulga Hopewell believes only in her wood leg, which she had lost many years ago. Having been named Joy in her birth, she thinks that she does not deserve such a name and begin to call herself Hulga. The culmination of irony is the episode when Hulgas leg is broken by Manley Pointer, a person from the country around Willohobie. When the leg is broken, Hunga understands that the life was spent in vain, because the only thing she believed in and considered to be the strongest is broken. The title of the story is the irony as not all people from the countryside as so good, as it may seem from the first side.

It may be concluded that Hulgas life was really spent in vain, but not because of her leg broken, but because all her life she believed in nothing and she did not have any aim. The leg cannot be the sense of peoples life as it is just a leg, and people should believe in something more real. Hulga did not have any goal, she did not try to reach something, it may be concluded that she did not live as it is impossible to live without aim and without any interest in life. Hulga just swans in the common flow and without desires and interests in her life, so this may be named the real reason for the vanity of her life. As for me, it is impossible to imagine life without aim or desire as people always want to reach something, they always have the sphere of interests.

Works Cited

OConnor, Flannery. A Good Man Is Hard to Find: And Other Stories. New York: Demco Media, 2002

Good Country People by Flannery OConnor is a story that is full of irony and this irony is achieved by means of the main character, Mrs. Freeman. Moreover, the very title of the story gives the effect of irony. After reading the story, it becomes understandable what the title means in reality and how fully it supports the ironic contest of the story.

The irony of the story is introduced by Hulga Hopewells attitude to life, being more specific to her faith and pride. As it is seen from the reading, Hulga Hopewell believes only in her wood leg, which she had lost many years ago. Having been named Joy in her birth, she thinks that she does not deserve such a name and begin to call herself Hulga. The culmination of irony is the episode when Hulgas leg is broken by Manley Pointer, a person from the country around Willohobie. When the leg is broken, Hunga understands that the life was spent in vain, because the only thing she believed in and considered to be the strongest is broken. The title of the story is the irony as not all people from the countryside as so good, as it may seem from the first side.

It may be concluded that Hulgas life was really spent in vain, but not because of her leg broken, but because all her life she believed in nothing and she did not have any aim. The leg cannot be the sense of peoples life as it is just a leg, and people should believe in something more real. Hulga did not have any goal, she did not try to reach something, it may be concluded that she did not live as it is impossible to live without aim and without any interest in life. Hulga just swans in the common flow and without desires and interests in her life, so this may be named the real reason for the vanity of her life. As for me, it is impossible to imagine life without aim or desire as people always want to reach something, they always have the sphere of interests.

Works Cited

OConnor, Flannery. A Good Man Is Hard to Find: And Other Stories. New York: Demco Media, 2002

“Good Country People”

Mrs. Hopewell gets up at 7:00 AM and turns lights and heaters on—for Mrs. Hopewell and Mrs.Hopewell’s daughter Joy. Mrs. Freeman and Mrs. Hopewell talk about big business every morning over breakfast together, most of it is not really that important then Mrs. Hopewell gets to gossiping in the kitchen with Mrs. Freeman. Joy, who is thirty-two years old and extremely intelligent, takes time coming into the kitchen since joy does not like to be around them while chatting.

Mrs. Freeman has two teenage daughters, one married and pregnant, and one not; the girls are a big topic of morning chat. Mrs. Hopewell employs the Freemans, they are tenant farming family—Mrs. Hopewell has liked having them here for the past four years—and they’ve worked out great because they are not trashy but actually, they are ‘good country people’, before the Freemans, a year was about the most a family stayed working for Mrs. Hopewell.

Joy has a grouchy attitude, but Mrs. Hopewell lets joy get by with it because joy has a wooden leg. When joy was ten, joy’s leg was shot off in a hunting accident. Joy’s name was legally changed to Hulga when Hulga was twenty-one, Hulga wanted to change it in spite of Hulgas mom, so Mrs. Hopewell doesn’t call Hulga that because Mrs. Hopewell hates that name. Hulga has a doctoral degree in philosophy but lives at home because Hulga has a heart condition and needs to be cared for by Mrs. Hopewell. Hulga might only live another ten years or so.

Other days a bible salesman would come but and try to sell bibles to Mrs. Hopewell and Mrs. Freeman. Today (Saturday) Mrs. Hopewell and Mrs. Freeman are questioning what Hulga talked about with the Bible salesman because Manley usually only talks to them, who came by yesterday; apparently, Hulga is an atheist. Manley Pointer, the Bible salesman, wasn’t able to sell Mrs. Hopewell a Bible, but Manley did get lunch, some conversation, and a date for today at 10:00 AM with Hulga out of the visit.

Hulga and Manley meet up and begin walking in the woods. They kiss and talk about God, damnation, nothingness, and Hulga’s leg. Hulga thinks Manley not nearly as smart as thought. When Manley suggests they find a place to sit down, Hulga leads Manley to the barn loft. Manley kisses Hulga more and takes away Hulga’s glasses. Hulga doesn’t notice. Manley tells Hulga “I love you” and wants Hulga to tell the same in return. Manley also wants to see where Hulga’s false leg attaches to the real one. Hulga ceases, involuntarily at first, to both requests.

After Manley removes the leg, Manley refuses to give it back. Hulga panics. Manley opens the Bible and It’s hollow inside. From the hollow, Manley removes whiskey, cards, and condoms. Hulga is not dazzled. Then goes on to demand the leg and loses all romantic feelings. Manley packs up the things… as well as Hulga’s leg. Then tells Hulga that Manley is just as smart as Hulga is and suggests that Manley completely fooled Hulga. Manley is an even bigger believer in nothing than Hulga is. Through the loft opening, Hulga watches Manley leave. Helga’s face is disturbed.

Mrs. Hopewell and Mrs. Freeman watch Manley leave, too. Mrs. Hopewell thinks Manley was selling Bibles to the black people who live in the direction from which Manley came. It’s not clear what Mrs. Freeman thinks, but Ms.freeman gets the last word in the story. No one knows what happens to Hulga.

The short story “Good Country People” by Flannery O’Connor was published in 1955. It is considered one of the best literary examples of a short story and is commonly studied in English-speaking literature courses. However, as time progresses, the relevance of the story may become outdated, beginning a discussion on its presence in the Americana literary canon. “Good Country People” deserves continuous recognition in the canon due to its brilliant prose, stylistic approach to the genre, and deep analysis of the human and social condition.

At first, it is apt to analyze the prose and stylistic approach utilized by O’Connor to drive forward the plot. One of the reasons the story is so successful and popular in literary circles is due to the author’s brilliant utilization of literary devices. Symbolism, allegory, irony, and imagery are perfectly balanced in the story, each with a purpose and meaning that allows readers to consider aspects beyond the story’s plot, but much greater philosophical ideologies of Christianity, nihilism, human wickedness, and others discussed below (Peiu 57). Thus, the narrative is so compelling that it helps the reader to respond and relate to the meaningful storytelling, perpetuating challenging moral self-analysis of whether one is as cynical or naïve as some of the characters.

The story “Good Country People” unfolds on a two-dimensional plane, with little insight into the minds of the characters, telling the narrative of pervasive and gloomy isolation and meaninglessness. O’Connor is direct in dialogue and descriptions, taking advantage of clichés and stereotypes as the driving point of the plot. The story is highly descriptive, but it remains simple and conversational, allowing the reader to build their own perceptions while forcing them to consider the meaning of each character interaction. Such literary mastery is rare in short-story writing, and therefore the study of O’Connor’s work became prevalent and widely recognized for its elements and sophistication to relay a complex idea. Other classical short story writers in the American canon, such as Twain or O’Henry, and Poe, from whom O’Connor drew inspiration, possessed a similar level of brilliant storytelling through the use of literary elements and stylistic devices.

One of the evident recognitions of an author in the canon is being established so by experts in the field. O’Connor has always been a controversial figure, starting in the post-war period and into recent years. Some saw her as a genius, while others saw a “certain narrowness of emphasis and predictability of technique” in her writing (Kelly). Nevertheless, her anthology of short stories, including the leading “Good Country People” as published by the Library of America, is “the closest thing to a formal canonization that our dispersed and eclectic culture can now bestow” (Kelly). O’Connor’s approach to short fiction is highly eccentric, and the essence of the debate centers around the worldview that her stories present. At the time of publication of “Good Country People,” O’Connor was faithful to church teachings while living in a conservative society. However, her stories were groundbreaking and dazzling, highlighting aspects of existentialism and social analysis unconventional for the time.

The title of the story, “Good Country People,” is inherently a reflection of the social condition. It is a reference to the perspective that the country people living a good, hardworking life are good and honest. Meanwhile, Mrs. Hopewell in the story refers to lazy people as “trash.” O’Connor was able to so accurately capture the sense of hierarchy and superiority that each of the characters holds over others. Mrs. Hopewell bases her perspective on origin and wealth, Hulga on self-appointed intelligence, and the salesman on manipulation and control. However, in each interaction and as the story progresses, the characters are challenged in their worldviews but continue to behave immorally and hypocritically. Mrs. Hopewell’s notion of religion and good country people are taken advantage of, while Hulga, thinking that others are naïve, allows herself to be naively fooled. In a manner, the salesman is symbolic of the Biblical concept of sin and temptation. Therefore, Mrs. Freeman, Mrs. Hopewell, and Hulga demonstrate themselves to be completely ignorant of the world, showing pervasive hypocrisy in their condescension.

This simple story has complex themes and motifs that underline the aspects of the human and social conditions: judgment, stereotypes, pretenses, and conflict. These are the unfortunate realities of human interaction, even in contexts of Christianity, class, or intelligence. No matter whether one is “good country people” or a highly cynical intelligent property-owning upper class, the story highlights the flaws in the worldviews of both. O’Connor inherently presents Southerners as victims of classic neurosis. The characters are obsessed with observing and judging others while at the same time drawn together by their deep-rooted issues and shared neurosis (Jones 53). This social and psychoanalysis is the reason for the brilliance and popularity of the short story. O’Connor is able to so simply emphasize these aspects of human nature without ever deeply delving into philosophical banters. Through juxtaposition and interaction of typical everyday characters, there emerges a much greater overlapping theme.

“Good Country People” can be considered a critical part of the American Southern literary canon. O’Connor, in this short story and her other writings, has always been considered by critics as a “keen analyst of the decadent South” (Jones 52). Using the gothic traditions of Edgar Allan Poe and engaging in the analysis of the perverse, abnormal psychology, the story broke traditional barriers of conservative evangelical Christian Southern culture. Christian critics attempt to explain O’Connor’s focus on the grotesque as a depiction of humanity in need of redemption. Nevertheless, the story is considered an iconic example of the Southern Gothic genre. Set in the fictive countryside of Georgia in the American Old South, where nothing ever happens, this grotesque story occurs based on the failure of people to understand each other, and the overwhelming presence of clichés, prejudices, and platitudes becomes the penultimate cause to the perverse ending of the encounter. O’Connor combines the many stylistic, cultural, and religious components of the American South to create her famous, groundbreaking, and eccentric narrative that serves as the epitome of Southern Gothic fiction to this day (Friedman 233).

In conclusion, O’Connor’s “Good Country People” is a classic example of a short story Southern American literature canon due to its stylistic writing, psychosocial analysis, and cultural value. The narrative’s brilliance is universally acclaimed in its genre, and with time, the short story has gained a solid place in the canon. It is important to study the story in literature classes as it helps students to understand aspects of genre writing, indirect development of characters, and implementation of philosophical discussions and social values into plot elements. The excellence with which O’Connor is able to achieve this supports the presence of “Good Country People” in canon.

Works Cited

Friedman, Melvin J. “Flannery O’Connor: Another Legend in Southern Fiction.” The English Journal, vol. 51, no. 4, 1962, pp. 233-243.

Jones, Bartlett C. “Depth Psychology and Literary Study.” Midcontinent American Studies Journal, vol. 5, no. 2, 1964, pp. 50-56.

Kelly, David. “Good Country People.”The New York Times. 2009, Web.

Peiu, Anca. “Three Sophisticated Ladies and Their Turns of Discourse: Edith Wharton, Flannery O’Connor, Alice Munro.” Philologica, vol. 8, no. 1, 2016, pp. 49-66.

In Flannery O’Connor’s short story “Good Country People,” a small household gets a visit from a young door-to-door Bible salesman. One of these women is Hulga Hopewell, who is 32 years old, feels ugly beyond belief, has earned a Ph.D. in philosophy, and must wear a false leg because her natural leg had been shot off in an accident when she was a child. While her mother invites the salesman in and considers him ‘good country people’ like she is, Hulga does not believe in anything and thinks to seduce this young man when he shows the slightest interest in her.

Alison Baker’s short story “Better be Ready ‘Bout Half Past Eight” is about a man having difficulties adjusting to his best friend’s decision to change his sex. These two stories would seem to have nothing at all in common. However, both O’Connor and Baker have illustrated humankind’s tendency to focus on the externals of a person’s identity rather than the more important internal person.

O’Connor presents her main character as having very little in the way of worldly experience, tending to base her understanding of herself and others on their external attributes. Because she has a Ph.D., Hulga believes she is much more experienced and worldly than those with whom her mother associates, but she continues living with her mother and isolates herself from the rest of society. She does this because she considers herself grotesque because of her thick glasses and missing leg, calling attention to it through her heavy step and ‘clumping’ movements.

She and her mother consider Manley Pointer as the innocent young country boy he presents himself to be. Her mother begins to refer to him almost immediately as ‘good country people.’ Although Hulga thinks her mother is supremely naïve for doing this, Hulga also falls into the trap of judging by externals when she relinquishes her artificial leg to him. She “felt entirely dependent on him. Her brain seemed to have stopped thinking altogether and to be about some other function that it was not very good at” (O’Connor, 1990, p. 289).

Despite her insistence on loathing the false leg and the thick glasses she depends on to see, in the end, Hulga finds she is literally left without a leg to stand on. She has already learned the danger in placing too much value on the external attributes of a person through the harsh betrayal of the Bible salesman and the story ends just as she is about to learn the rewards of finding internal value as she will need to find these in herself in order to survive.

The main character of Baker’s story, Byron, is demonstrated to be an intelligent, quick-witted mild-mannered individual from the immediate opening of the story. Upon being told his best friend is ‘changing sex’, his responses remain rational and non-judgmental – on the surface. When Zach tells Byron that he is really a woman on the inside, Byron has a difficult time accepting the idea, insisting that Zach is a man.

While he seems to immediately accept the idea that Zach is going to go through the process of changing his physical sex to that of a woman, his inability to cope with the idea that his friend will be the same person on the inside is revealed as he thinks about the announcement later. “Zach wouldn’t be Zach when he came back. He would be a woman Byron had never met” (Baker, 1993: 94). The depth of this belief is brought out again when Zach returns to the office the next day wearing eye shadow and pointing out that he’s been growing breasts for several months now. “All day he tried not to look at Zach’s breasts, but there they were, right in front of him, as Zach bent over the bench or peered into the microscope, or leaned back with his hands behind his neck, staring at the ceiling, thinking” (Baker, 1993: 94).

This obsession continues to grow as Byron attempts to reconcile the idea that his best friend, the man he grew up with, is really a woman inside. This inability to reconcile these ideas, that Zach and Zoe are really the same people and only the external portion of this person has changed exposes the same processes at work that are seen in the O’Connor story – that people are categorized and understood based on the external attributes of their personality rather than their internal realities.

Although these stories are vastly different in terms of plotline and characters, they both explore the same fundamental attribute of human nature – that people tend to make assessments regarding other people based on their external appearance rather than their internal personality.

Hulga felt she was both superior, because of her Ph.D., and inferior, because of her false leg and weak eyes, to other people. As a result, she could not be happy in public or isolated within her mother’s house. Both her mother and she felt the Bible salesman was ‘good country people’, one to assume made no threat and the other to assume she could victimize and both to their detriment. Byron felt he was losing his best friend when he discovered Zach was a woman named Zoe inside. However, once Hulga and Byron were forced to look inside, they discovered where the real value lay.

Works Cited

Baker, Alison. “Better Be Ready ‘Bout Half Past Eight.” The Atlantic Monthly. 1993.

O’Connor, Flannery. “Good Country People.” The Complete Stories. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1990, pp. 271-91.

Introduction

The short story “Good Country People” by Flannery O’Connor is an intricate psychoanalytical exploration of the characters that are not so different from regular people. In each person and family, some hidden idiosyncrasies and dysfunctions morph their relationship and outlook on the world. The main characters of the story observe and relate to others through judgment leading to their perceptions and blind belief in certain ideas to be fundamentally challenged.

Mrs. Freeman and Hopewell

Mrs. Freeman and Mrs. Hopewell in the story are often observing the world around them and placing themselves around other people. The third-person omniscient point of view from the narrator allows the reader to glance into the minds of several introduced characters. Both women exemplify a tremendous amount of judgment about others while being self-absorbed. This is evident especially in Mrs. Hopewell’s “good country people,” an example of her naivete that people around her are either “trash” or good-hearted. She considers herself be wise in the supposedly accurate judgment of character. However, she did accept that life isn’t perfect, with people having their faults. Mrs. Hopewell was kind and patient, seeking goodness in people. Mrs. Freeman was straightforward, constantly voicing her opinion and never admitting she was wrong. Instead, she often sought to point out the mistakes of others. Egoistically, she took credit for the thoughts that Mrs. Hopewell voiced. Around others Mrs. Freeman was often observant, choosing to look quietly on from her favorite spot in the room. At times, she showed some compassion and understanding, especially towards her daughters and Hulga (O’Connor, 218-224). The women’s strong-willed characters mixed with arrogance twist their view of the world.

Impressions

The initial response to the story’s title was presumptuous, but it was drastically changed as the narrative progressed. Originally, the title gives a perception of a narrative that will be focused on rural life with all its platitudes. However, the brilliance of this story is that the use of clichés such as “good country people” tends to blind the characters to the true nature of things (Donley, par. 5). The phrase itself is a judgment given out by the Hopewell family based on social status. The title brought to attention from the very beginning jumps out at the reader every time it is used, setting up the trust that Hopewells do have in the “country people.” At first, the story seems to be set up as a family conflict until the appearance of Manley Pointer. “‘Aren’t you,’ she murmured, ‘aren’t you just good country people?’” (O’Connor, 254). By the end, the reader realizes that the title plays a driving force behind the narrative so ironically that blind cliché judgment is misplaced. The impression of the title changes drastically as the reader is amazed at the radically misconceived opinions as well as the sudden change of character in Manley Pointer. Meanwhile, in her arrogance, Hulga experiences a twisted and humbling embarrassment by being fooled. The world that she thought she knew so well through her education suddenly became grounded in reality. Similarly, the reader undergoes a sort of catharsis, now forced to think about their own possibly misplaced judgments and stereotypes.

Conclusion

A person’s perception of the world changes with personal life experience. The arrogance and judgment of Mrs. Hopewell and Mrs. Freeman is an example of close-minded people. Their ideals are misconceived and are fundamentally challenged by the ironic situations in the narrative.

Works Cited

Donley, Carol. “Good Country People.”NYU School of Medicine, n.d. Web.

O’Connor, Flannery. “Good Country People.” A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories. Harcourt Brace & Co., 2001, pp. 217-253.

O’Connor’s “Good Country People” is a story that revolves around Joy-Hulga the main protagonist and Manley Pointer, the antagonist. Joy who later changes her name to Hulga has lost a leg during a childhood accident and is fitted with a wooden leg. She holds a doctorate in philosophy and has a disdain for her mother’s southern, Christian manners. She leads a reclusive life, till one day she happens to meet a charming Bible salesman named Manley Pointer. She connects with the salesman instantly due to her declaration of atheism. Their friendship develops in an intimate vein and it leads to a secluded loft in a barn. Manley Pointer in an intimate moment, asks her to take off her artificial leg. When she agrees to remove her prosthetic leg, he grabs her wooden leg, stuffs it into his suitcase, and leaves her stranded in the loft. Thesis: Flannery O’Connor builds the plot of “Good Country People” on the theme of deceptive appearances using a framework of symbolism and irony.

The element of irony is very much overpowering in this story. Thus there is irony in the title, in the characters, in the name of the characters, and also in the title of the story. The story is not about ‘good country people” but complicated people with deceptive appearances. Hulga is not as happy as she sometimes thinks she is. Her mother is not as proud of her daughter as she shows outwardly. The Bible salesman is not as religious as he pretends he is. Thus they are all people who deceive – either their selves or others. The irony in the name is well brought out by Joy, who is anything but joyous. Sometimes she took walks “but she didn’t like dogs or cats or birds or flowers or nature or nice young men. She looked at nice young men as if she could smell their stupidity”. The loss of her leg in a hunting accident made her feel disillusioned about life. Mrs. Hopewell and Mrs. Freedom are not positive people either as their names would suggest. Connor’s irony is most devastating when there are characters in self-love. The juxtaposition of criminal and lady is evident in Hulga formerly Joy, who delights in her ugliness and intelligence. By an “act of will,” she loves her brooding, skeptical conception of the world. Her “constant outrage had obliterated every expression from her face,” but it gives her “pleasure.” Her artificial leg symbolizes this crippled view (Malin, 37). The Bible salesman Miss O’Connor introduces is frightening to Hulga: he seems so happy, believing in all the things she cannot. Hulga decides to hurt him to regain her cruel certainty; she plans to seduce him. But the Bible salesman turns out to be a criminal who seduces her so that he can add her leg to his collection. Hulga allows him to because she likes being worshipped. The end of the story is startling: the Bible salesman flees after admitting that he too believes in nothing except his pleasure. Hulga is left without her wooden support. She can no longer use the world; it uses her.

Connors does use symbolism through artifacts the main one being the wooden foot of Hulga. When the wooden leg is introduced into the story, the reader is compelled to feel sympathy and pity for Hulga because the leg was “literally blown off” in a hunting accident. Hulga is also seen to use the wooden leg as a tool for getting attention at home. For example, she stomps through the house, deliberately making a loud “ugly-sounding” noise. Due to her physical disability, she also feels crippled internally and is unable to socialize or mix with the general crowd. She develops her own identity around the wooden leg. According to Flannery O’Connor, the story does manage “to operate at another level of experience, by letting the wooden leg accumulate meaning”. She explains that Joy-Hulga is not only physically crippled but also spiritually crippled. “She believes in nothing but her own belief in nothing, and we perceive that there is a wooden part of her soul that corresponds to her wooden leg”. The wooden leg accumulates meaning as the story develops and the reader gets to know the feelings of the girl about her leg, the views of her mother regarding it, and how the countrywoman on the place feels about it. When the Bible salesman steals it, the reader easily understands that he takes away part of the girl’s personality (O’Connor, “Writing Short Stories” in Mystery and Manners). The story largely concerns deformations of the body which reflect corruptions of the spirit (Browning, 45). Other symbols such as the Bible are hollowed out in the center and contains a blue box of condoms and a deck of porn pictured playing cards. This symbolizes the deception that is possible among religious people such as Pointer. When he steals her prosthetic leg, he proudly declares: “Pointer ain’t really my name. I use a different name at every house I call at and don’t stay nowhere long”. He reveals his true nature saying that he is no believer: “you ain’t so smart. I been believing in nothing ever since I was born!”(20). Another powerful symbol is Hulga’s glasses. Hulga has trouble seeing without glasses. To symbolically indicate that her perception of life -as she knew it -was changed, Pointer is said to take her glasses away in the hayloft: “When her glasses got in his way, he took them off her and slipped then into his pocket” (287). Pointer makes her blind by this act and robs Hulga of the ability to perceive clearly. He does this before exploiting her trust in the most grotesque manner possible – by stealing her wooden leg. Here the glasses are symbolic of the clarity of vision of Hulga.

Thus, we find that Flannery O’Connor through her plot and characters deals with the theme of deceptive appearances. Her use of symbolism is evident through the many artifacts whereas irony permeates through the title, the names of characters, the plot, and the complex characters themselves.

Works Cited

O’Connor, Flannery (1971). The Complete Short Stories. New York: Farrar.

Malin, Irving (1962). New American Gothic. Southern Illinois University Press. Carbondale.

Browning, M. Preston Jr. (1974). Flannery O’Connor. Southern Illinois University Press. Carbondale, IL.

In a short story Good Country People, O’Connor provides a plethora of reflections about the true attitude of people to religion and the nature of people’s relations with each other. The main character of this story, Joy, is a woman with physical challenge. She lost her leg in childhood and, probably, at the same time lost her belief into religion as a set of rules that should regulate human lives, thus, making this world better.

For Joy, religion has no sense; she cannot imagine the presence of God in this world which is full of violence and unfairness. People often try to explain the real meaning of things without understanding their true nature, being blind to see pure knowledge. Therefore, the key message implies that people use religion as a shield behind which they can hide their true attitude to life.

However, even well-educated people make the wrong conclusions when they start believe in nothing. The author uses irony in order to emphasize that when one is sure of the true nature of things from the scientific position of view, the universe is empty and God is a fiction, one cannot live without reflections about the supreme power that always exists in people’s lives. Hence, if there is no God in someone’s life, the empty space will be replaced by evil.

The story is based on a line of contradictions between science and religion, education and foolishness. Despite her solid education, Joy tends to isolate herself from the rest of the humankind, feeling that she loses her faith. Because of that, she changes her name, choosing the ugliest one possible, i.e. Hulga. In addition, her relations with mother are as bad as than they can possibly be. One can notice that Hulga does not love her mother; treating the latter as an enemy.

Hulga’s attitude towards her mother makes it obvious that the women is much like one of those good country people around but not Hulga’s family member. Thus, when Hulga changes the name, she feels satisfied by the victory over mother: “One of her major triumphs was that her mother had not been able to turn her dust into Joy, but the greater one was that she had been able to turn it herself into Hulga” (O’Connor 1632).

Hulga believes in nothing, which becomes obvious from her consideration of life and world, the universe is empty. She supposes that religious people as the fools who are unable to comprehend the real meaning of things and, therefore, replace it by mystical beliefs.

However, as a result of her new spiritual experiments, Hulga replaces the emptiness within by evil, which further on leads to her is inability to believe in goodness, God or another supreme power that could affect her life. Hulga’s reflections make stronger after meeting with a Bible salesman Manley Pointer, who, at first glance, seems religious and gentle, yet later on steels Hulga’s wooden leg.

In addition, the author adds considerable irony to the novel, making the main character, a woman with such powerful mind, physically challenged. Hulga supposes that she is better than all those good country people who believe in their God, including her mother, neighbors and a Bible salesman.

It is peculiar that Hulga’s assurance grows stronger when she learns that Manley Pointer is an atheist and, in fact, he is even more evil than people who seems less religious. Obviously, Hulga’s previous conviction that the universe is empty changes to the belief that the world is based on evil.

Finally, she gains the mystical knowledge that was missing during her previous study, yet this is the knowledge of evil. Therefore, although Hulga finally comes to possessing the knowledge which she was longing for, she is still unable to see the beauty of the universe or to feel the presence of goodness in human life.

Works Cited

O’Connor, Flannery. “Good country people.” The American Traditions in Literature, 12 ed. Ed. George Perkins and Barbara Perkins. US: McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Science/Languages, 2008. 1632. Print.

The theme of a sense of non-belonging of intellectuals in a rural setting is unfolded in the main characters of Edith Wharton’s novel Ethan Frome and Flannery O’Connor’s short story Good Country People. Both novels portray people with educational and intellectual aspirations who have been challenged by life circumstances and could not fulfill their dreams. This paper argues that Ethan and Joy represent intelligent individuals unable to be happy among rural people due to differences in worldviews and values.

The main characters in Ethan Frome and Good Country People are intellectuals with failed educational or intellectual careers plans. Ethan Frome had always “wanted to be an engineer and to live in towns, where there were lectures and big libraries” (Wharton 41). Similarly, Joy wanted to live in a town and continue her philosophy career. However, the difference between the two characters’ failed intellectual ambitions is in the reason why they stayed in the country. Indeed, for Joy, she “had made it plain that if it had not been for this condition, she would be far from these red hills and good country people” (O’Connor 5). On the other hand, Ethan did not go to live in town because of his moral obligation to his family.

Living in rural areas, both characters are exposed to conflicts with other people due to their otherness. Her community and family do not support Joy’s intellectual aspirations because they attribute her to some complexity of character. Indeed, Joy’s mother “could not help but feel that it would have been better if the child had not taken the Ph.D.” (O’Connor 5). Similarly, Ethan Frome did not belong to the rural surroundings because his ultimate aspiration was to pursue his engineering occupation in the city and continue his educational career. He is different from his wife, Zeena, who represents rurality because he seeks development, and she does not want to live in a place that dominates her. Indeed, “in the greater cities which attracted Ethan, she would have suffered a complete loss of identity” (Wharton 41). Overall, from the first pages of the novel, Ethan is perceived as an alien in the village due to his intellectuality, which resembles his similarity with Joy.

Since Joy obtained a Ph.D., it induced conflict with the people around her since they failed to relate to her profession. It was not appropriate to say, “my daughter is a philosopher” (O’Connor 5) within rural values. In a rural community, people are thought to be “good” if they “do not want to go to college” but are willing to “devote [their] life to Christian service” like the Bible salesman (O’Connor 8). Since Joy is the complete opposite of such rural ideals, with a degree in philosophy and an atheist worldview, she does not have a sense of belonging to rurality.

Both characters conflict with the rurality they live in. Ethan is “unhappy” in the “oppressive reality” where his sensitivity and open-minded worldview contradict the expected conformity to the rural way of living (Wharton 20-22). Similarly, the rurality is despised by Joy due to the persistence of gossiping, shallow conversations, and mediocre worldviews “good country people” shared. On the contrary to them, Joy values sincerity and openness, which is validated by her choice of an “ugly” name (O’Connor 4). She selected the name Hulga instead of Joy based on “its ugly sound and then the full genius of its fitness” to her identity regardless of the dislikes of others (O’Connor 4). Likewise, Ethan engages in adultery to follow his desires despite the community’s disapproval and criticism.

In conclusion, the comparison of the novel and the short story unveils the similarity of Ethan’s and Joy’s intellectualism as the source of their unhappiness in and exclusion from the rural community. Although they had different reasons for abandoning their intellectual aspirations, they suffered from circumstances that limited their opportunity for growth. Thus, Flannery O’Connor and Edith Wharton conveyed the complexity of the theme of not belonging through the perspective of a mismatch between one’s intellectual potential and the means of expressing it.

Works Cited

O’Connor, Flannery. Good Country People, 1955, Web.

Wharton, Edith. Ethan Frome. EMC/Paradigm Publishing, 1998.