ENGL 4310

After I read Chelsea's post about the "Free Radicals" short story, I began comparing the story with the O'Connor stories we've read. Obviously, a stranger comes to town and Nita's world was turned upside down. For me, though, that is one of the only things they do have in common. Like Chelsea pointed out, the author of "Free Radicals" killed off her villain and left Nita relatively unharmed. If we compare this to O'Connor's short stories in which a stranger comes to town, it seems that the villain's primary function is to teach the other character(s) a valuable lesson, and it is the other characters that walk away changed. Although Nita assumed Bett's identity in order to pacify the stranger, I don't really feel like she will be a changed person because she knows that she only has a short time to live. That knowledge kind of seemed to empower her against the stranger because she knows that she doesn't have much to lose. O'Connor's characters, on the other hand, often have a self-righteous attitude about life and the revelation they gain from the stranger's presence causes their world to come crumbling down around them.

In "A Good Man is Hard to Find," the family encounters the Misfit and they ultimately wind up dead. Right before the Misfit kills the grandmother, she has been drastically changed and, if allowed to live, would likely view the world differently. The grandmother, like Nita, probably doesn't have many years ahead of her, but her encounter with the Misfit changed her in a way that Nita's did not. Also, in "The Life you Save may be your Own," Mr. Shiflet physically displaces the young Lucynell and drives off unaffected by the experience. In "Good Country People," the bible salesman steals Hulga's leg, leaving her up in the loft reflecting on what just happened to her. The bible salesman is not changed by the encounter, other than the fact that he has acquired a new installment to his collection of body parts. One last example... In "The Lame Shall Enter First," Rufus Johnson's admittance into Sheppard's family ultimately leads to Sheppard's epiphany and Norton's death, while, as far as we know, he walks away from the situation unchanged.