ENGL 4310

Josie’s blog Language as a Dividing Factor struck a cord with me because it brought back memories of conversations we had in high school while we were rehearsing “The Miracle Worker.” “The Miracle Worker” is of course the play based on Helen Keller’s story of how Anne Sullivan ultimately taught her how to spell and speak.

For almost five years Helen Keller was completely unable to communicate. In her memoirs she described herself as being in the “double dungeon of darkness and silence” until Anne Sullivan taught her to communicate. Sullivan originally taught Keller how to communicate by having her spell things with sign language alphabet, but Keller did not fully comprehend that the things Sullivan was spelling actually were the names of the objects until she had an epiphany at the water pump. Somehow she remembered the word for “Water” from when she was a child, and connected that word with what the object was. From then on, Keller understood and was able to learn and communicate with those around her.

In the facisnating video on this page Anne Sullivan explains how Helen Keller ultimately learned how to actually speak. I just thought it would be interesting in talking about characters that are unable to communicate to remember the most famous example of someone who overcame that inability.

I thought I would do my best to fill in a few gaps in Sara’s The Ten Commandments blog.

IV. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.
I am not 100% sure if it happened on a Sunday or not but Parker’s Mother dragging him to the revival could work for this commandment. Parker of course ran out of the meeting, and did not keep the Sabbath holy.

VII. Thou shalt not commit adultery.
Ok, this one is a stretch, but because Mr. Shiftlet married Lucynell and then abandoned her, I think it can be assumed that he will eventually technically commit adultery.

VIII. Thou shalt not steal.
Mr. Shiftlet’s stealing the car in “The Life You Save May Be Your Own…” was not mentioned, but I think that could be a valid example of this commandment.

X. Thou shalt not covet.
I think that there is a lot of this in “Good Country People.” First, I think that Hulga covets the life she once had as a scholar, not to mention, she covets the lives of other “normal” people because they do not have a handicap. “Mr. Pointer” obviously, for whatever bizarre reason, covets random tokens, such as Hulga’s leg and the glass eye he had previously stolen.


And I had a question about “Thou shalt not kill” because Sara had mentioned “The Lame Shall Enter First” as one of the stories in which a killing happened and I wondered if it was listed because Johnson effectively “killed” Norton by leading him to suicide, because Norton committed suicide, or both?

In Brittni’s blog Are you feeling it? she brings up the point that an author can sort of feel if a there story is meant to be a short story or a novel. I think this can be true in any art form. A poet chooses if their poem is going to fit into a certain form, or into an open form style. Or, just like Brittni mentioned, sometimes I also have trouble trying to decide if a story is meant to be a play or a short story. I agree with Brittni that I think it comes down to what “feels” right. If a work is pulling in one direction but the artist tries to force it in another, it often gets bogged down in itself.

We have talked about in class how our authors’ illnesses often interfered with their work. I think that this might have not only contributed to why they wrote primarily short stories but I also must wonder if they sort of became “programmed” to think of stories in a shorter context. I am not saying that O’Connor and Porter would have been unable to write a novel, but just like I mainly see the stories I concoct as plays because theatre has been ingrained in me, I wonder if because they’re lives were constantly interrupted if their brains thought of short stories instead of novels. The “feeling” was right for them to do shorter works because they just instinctively knew that their writing might be interrupted.

It is really interesting to think about how political, social, and personal situations might affect the way an author comes up with a story.

Rachel’s blog on Porter and Crane was interesting to me because I had also read Porter’s letters to and about Crane. Both of our authors know just the way to cut someone down to size with a sense of grace and wit that many people do not have. In her letter to Hart Crane on page 45 I was fascinated that Porter starts out quite benignly with “First about the lunch. I was disappointed too…” before she tells Crane that she did not go out to say hello to him because he called her a “whore and a fancy-woman.”

She writes, “You know you have the advantage of me, because I share the superstition of our time about the somewhat romantic irresponsibility of drunkenness, holding it a social offense to take seriously things said and done by a drunken person.” I just love how she will write something so matter-of-factly and underscore it with a biting comment. She later writes a little more bluntly, “I am beginning to believe that a sanitarium for the mentally defective is the proper place for you. If this is true, I should be sorry at having been angry with you. But I think it is time you grew up and stopped behaving like a very degenerate adolescent.”

When we talked about the letters in class, we were always fascinated by the way in which O’Connor and Porter get after people and how that wit often carried over into their stories. It’s a shame that people just can’t insult other people like they used to.

I know that we didn’t use the critical lens of Post-Colonialism on “Noon Wine,” but I can’t help but focus on the idea of “othering” in this story. I don’t know much about Post-Colonialism but I know that it carries the idea of creating an other. The Thompsons “othered” Mr. Helton when he came to the farm because he looked, and spoke (and because he didn’t speak) differently from the family. They disliked the way how he was not a person who spoke much, and when he did his accent was very different from everyone else that they knew. Mrs. Thompson even helped to other Mr. Helton because he didn’t eat as much as she thought that he should.
Mr. Helton further othered himself when it turned out that he was a very effective worker. He created something that the family wasn’t use to having, which was a productive, strong farm. He enjoyed working, because he was able to make the farm a success where Mr. Thompson had failed because he hated the work.

Although it is very interesting that in the end of the story Mr. Helton is no longer considered an other when another stranger and other (Mr. Hatch) comes to the farm. Only when Mr. Hatch points out that Mr. Helton should be an other does Mr. Thompson recognize that Mr. Helton is now like a member of the family. It is also interesting that if Mr. Thompson had kept Mr. Helton as an other, then Mr. Thompson wouldn’t have felt the need to protect him, causing the death of Mr. Hatch.

Just like in Chelsea's blog I noticed, especially on the second reading of "He," that the idea of keeping up appearances is a huge factor in the stories. I counted and found that the idea of or actually saying “I won’t let the neighbors say…” came up seventeen times in “He” and the story is only nine pages long. Mrs. Whipple was the main source of those worries, and we have all agreed that what she did was wrong. But I think that Mr. Whipple has been skipped over and I think that he did his son the worst wrong.

We talked about it in class how Mrs. Whipple basically gives Mr. Whipple permission to not really care for and love their son, “’It’s natural for a mother,’ Mrs. Whipple would remind him. ‘You know yourself it’s more natural for a mother to be that way. People don’t expect so much of fathers, some way’” (49). And with this statement, Mr. Whipple doesn’t even try to love their son. In fact he doesn’t even care about Him at all. It’s only Mrs. Whipple that ever cares what the neighbors will say, and as bad as it is to only care what the neighbors think, Mr. Whipple doesn’t care about their son at all.

Mr. Whipple never shows any concern for really anyone in the family, his only concern is that they are down on their luck and will never be able to get back up. Whenever anything goes wrong, he always has some comment to the effect of “Great, just one more thing to make life miserable.” When He gets sick and needs to see the doctor all Mr. Whipple can think is, “All the way there and back he worried about where the money was to come from: it sure did look like he had about all the troubles he could carry” (57). Mrs. Whipple at least tries to think about the needs of her son, but Mr. Whipple only cares about how miserable his life is.

When rereading “The Displaced Person” like Josie I also found lots of hypocrisy, and almost all of it was done by Mrs. Shortly. A very interesting part of the story is when Mrs. Shortly is afraid that Mr. Guizac will find Mr. Shortly’s still and tell Mrs. McIntyre, which will lead to Mrs. McIntyre firing the Shortlys. Mrs. McIntyre would consider the still a second job and plus, just the fact that she would disapprove of having a still on her land would result in the firing of the Shortlys. So wouldn’t a person think that if where they were working and someone is breaking the rules, shouldn’t that someone tell the boss what is going on? I personally think that that is good ethics. Mrs. Shortly however doesn’t think so, “But with foreigners on the place, with people who were all eyes and no understanding, who had come from a place continually fighting, where the religion had not been reformed—with this kind of people, you had to be on the lookout every minute” (295-296).
Mrs. Shortly just can’t understand that Mr. Guizac is a good honest man and expects others to be, so he is more Christian and just a better person than Mrs. Shortly, even with all of her talk of the Guizac’s not having a “reformed” religion. She thinks that she can do whatever she wants because she is not trash and has been with Mrs. McIntyre for two years. I love the fact that Mrs. Shortly considers “no understanding” to be that of “do what you want, just don’t get caught by the boss. “ She puffs herself up so highly in her own mind that she just can’t see her own short comings or even realizes that she is being hypocritical. I love the fact that Mrs. Shortly considers “no understanding” to be that of “do what you want, just don’t get caught by the boss. “

I'm trying to work through the Catholic notions for the paper I'm writing and after reading Josie's blog on Parker's Back I'm intrigued with the physical pain or suffering Parker puts himself through and how it relates to the spirit. We are told about his first tattoo and that "It hurt very little, just enough to make it appear to Parker to be worth doing. This was peculiar too for before he had thought that only what did not hurt was worth doing" (p.658). I am learning how significant this suffering would be to a Catholic. That Christ was flesh and blood, physically a man and God is a truth they are constantly aware of. I was also interested in a comment I found in Chelsea Oaks blog quoting O'Connor as saying, in one of her letters: "Sarah Ruth was the heretic--the notion that you can worship in pure spirit" (1218). The point is that as a Catholic see it, you can't worship in pure spirit, it is a physical worship as well. This is evident in the sacramental Eucharist, one of the most important Christian sacraments, where they partake of the body and blood of Christ. It adds depth of meaning to the story to me although I don't pretend to completely understand it. As readers we watch O.E. go from the garden and fall of man to the Crucifixion and his own redemption as, I believe, he receives the Grace of God: ". . . all at once he felt the light pouring through him, turning his spider web soul into a perfect arabesque of colors, a garden of trees and birds and beasts" (p.673). What I am still trying to understand is the part this physical pain plays, the suffering that seems necessary in order to receive that redemption and grace besides the suffering. There is a desire for his all along to be accepted by the very one that would reject him and a desire for him to see himself as out of the ordinary. The pictures are for him to look at until the end when, he claims, the one on his back is for him wife to look at. But even this effects him while she remains blind.

"Revelation" is one of my favorite stories that we've read this semester. I think this is because Mrs. Turpin doesn't just fall off her high horse; she is shoved off of it, and very forcefully too. On re-reading the story, it seems to me that she switches places with the "ugly girl" or the "white trash" that she met in the doctor's office. Obviously, she drastically changes after her encounter with the girl, but I didn't initially see it as a switching of places. I came to this conclusion based on how the eyes and glances of the characters are repeatedly portrayed, and how those images change immediately after Mrs. Turpin is hit with the book.

Mrs. Turpin is described in the first paragraph as having "little bright black eyes" (633). In the same paragraph, the narrator describes the little white-trash boy as having "eyes idle in his head." This description, however, does not just apply to the little boy, but to all the white trash in the office. Most of their eyes seem to be described as "expressionless" (641) or "vacant" (635). This suggests to the reader that the narrator is likely not reliable because everything we are told comes from the perspective of Mrs. Turpin and so our images of the characters are tainted with how Mrs. Turpin sees the world. In other words, the narrator does not present us with an objective view of the office. Soon after Mrs. Turpin enters the office and makes some quick judgments, her eyes meet those of the well-dressed, agreeable woman's. Other than this moment and a a moment where we are told that her eyes "sparkle" (637), there is no reference to the agreeable woman's eyes or her gaze; this is because Mrs. Turpin views her as an equal, and so there is no need to make any distinction between her own eyes and this woman's; they, too, are equal.

When Mrs. Turpin notices the ugly girl watching her, she describes her eyes/gaze with such words as: "scowl", "smirk", "smolder", "unnatural light", and "peculiar". Being the daughter of the agreeable woman, this girl is clearly not white trash. However, she is ugly and has a disagreeable disposition, so her eyes are not described as "bright" or "twinkling". Mrs. Turpin is disturbed by the girl because she cannot put her finger on how to categorize her, which is probably why her eyes are described with terms that seem to only apply to her.

Immediately after the girl launches herself at Mrs. Turpin, Mrs. Turpin's vision is altered and she has a kind of out-of-body experience (it may also be significant to note that the book hits Mrs. Turpin directly over her eye). She quickly recovers and her "vision suddenly revers(es) itself" (645). When this happens, I don't just think that she is just regaining her senses; I think she switches places with the "undesirable" people in the office. When Mrs. Turpin meets the eye of her attacker, the girl's eyes seemed "much lighter than before, as if a door that had been tightly closed behind them was now open to admit light and air" (645). The girl seems to have been bettered by this experience, whereas Mrs. Turpin's gaze is henceforth depicted with terms which previously only applied to the girl: "scowl", "glowered", "wrathful". Also, there are a few instances where she seems to be gazing vacantly at the world around her, much as the white trash were described in the office. Another circumstance which leads me to believe that Mrs. Turpin has indeed switched places is when "her lower lip protruded dangerously" (651). This immediately recalls the instant in the office when the girl's "lower lip turned downwards and inside out" (640) and Mrs. Turpin thinks to herself that it is the "ugliest face" she has ever seen. Well, it seems that she has not only adopted that ugly face, but a very disagreeable disposition as well.

It is obvious to the reader that she is a proud woman that is constantly concerned with how others view her, but these insights help us to better understand how she views her her son. What she says to others are often lies ("I just took off His big blanket to wash") that are nothing more than a front to make herself look or feel better herself and are not an honest representation of how she really feels about her son.

I think I missed a lot of things the first time I read "The Displaced Person." Although I did note that there was some significance attached to the peacocks, I didn't examine what that might have been because my eye was caught by other aspects of the story. I just re-read through the blogs about "The Displaced Person," and found that the discussion about peacocks was very interesting, particularly in Jillian's blog. In her blog, she notes that it is only the Judge and the priest who appreciate the peacock's beauty. Both Mrs. Shortley and Mrs. McIntyre seem to be completely indifferent to the beautiful birds. This is evident when Mrs. Shortely is standing under the tree (that has the peacock in it) and with her "unseeing eyes directly in front of the peacock's tail....She might have been looking at a map of the universe but she didn't notice it" (290-291). I only bring this up because, later on, Mrs. Shortley expresses the opinion that foreigners are "all eyes and no understanding" (295). We can say the same thing about her because, for one reason or another, she cannot understand why anyone would be fascinated by the peacocks. Maybe she doesn't "understand" beauty, and so wouldn't the priest would be justified in saying that Mrs. Shortley is "all eyes and no understanding?"

Another thing I completely failed to notice was when the Guizac family arrives on the farm, Mrs. Shortely describes each of them as they step out of the car,

"out jumped two children, a boy and a girl, and then, stepping more slowly, a woman in brown, shaped like a peanut. Then the front door opened and out stepped the man, the Displaced Person." (286)

So I take back part of what I said in My Response to Sara's Ten Commandments Post. After just reading "That Tree" and "Flowering Judas" I realize that adultery is very prevalent in Porter's stories. It is not, as I had presupposed, only there in "Maria Concepcion." Obviously, adultery is hinted at in "Rope" but I am unsure as a reader if it actually happened or was only a suspicion. However, in "That Tree" the Journalist (who doesn't have a name, which I find incredibly interesting. Why is that, do you think? Why does he not have a name while Miriam does?) sleeps with another woman and has a baby with her before Miriam ever comes to Mexico. Is this something that Porter saw a lot of in Mexico because in both "Maria Concepcion" and "That Tree" the men not only sleep with other women, but they also have children with them. Whereas in other stories, the men only sleep with the women. Of course, I take that back because in "Flowering Judas" Braggioni has numerous affairs and nothing is ever said about children, unless I missed it.

Anyway, I wonder why adultery is apart of many contentious marriages in Porter's stories. Is it just that adultery has been known as the reason for divorce for centuries (before the whole "no-fault" divorce was ever instituted, that is)? However, in those cases it was usually the man divorcing the woman for infidelity, while the woman had to have some other "wrong" done to her such as brutality, and she had to prove it, while the man just had to say it. Perhaps this is why these women stay in these marriages with the men who have affairs? I think that might be the case because the only woman who leaves the marriage is Miriam in "That Tree" and she doesn't know about the other woman at all.

I know that the adultery is not the sole reason for the unhappy marriages in these stories, but adultery does play a part in them. It is true that Miriam and the Journalist's marriage lacks communication and understanding, while the relationship in "Rope" lacks trust. In "That Tree" the affair is never discussed because he does not think he can tell her about it (hence lack of communication), and the woman in "Rope" is even more distrustful of her husband because she thinks he has an affair. Then there are the women in "Maria Concepcion" and "Flowering Judas" who take their husbands back after the sordid affairs. Maria takes her husband along with his illegitimate child back after the affair, and Braggioni's wife apologizes for being upset that he has many affairs. What is all of that about? Perhaps a little research into the Mexican culture would be interesting. I do remember that in "Maria Concepcion" the women in the community are mad at Maria for being so upset about her husband's affair. They basically say that it happens to everyone, and she should just get over it.

I keep thinking that I have decided on my topic concerning marriage, and then I change my mind. Now I am thinking that I will tie in Adultery and how it goes hand-in-hand with other problems in the marriages of Porter's stories. I don't know if Porter ever had affairs or was cheated on, but she seems to write about it a lot, and I'm not sure why. We shall see, we shall see.

Josie's comments in Living with Contradictions were interesting. I can't help wondering if Mrs. Whipple did really love her son, but was still "othering" him, that she could not accept him as the same or of the same worth as her "normal" children. He seemed to me to be made so much the animal who could be loved and tended, but who couldn't feel like humans do. The language Porter uses supports this too and there is so much animal imagery, he climbs up the tree like a monkey etc.: "He ate squatting in the corner, smacking and mumbling. Rolls of fat covered Him like an overcoat." Besides the fact that he is eating like an animal, not at the table with utensils, he has an "overcoat." The implication almost suggests a coat of skins, an animal hide. This would be interesting to look at in terms of the lack of ability to communicate, I can't remember who is doing their paper with this focus, but because we are all aware that he is no different, he can feel, it is interesting that what He does lack is the ability to express those feelings in language. There is some body language going on in the story on his part, but it is limited. He runs from the sow. When Mrs. Whipple boxes Him on the ears: "He blinked and blinked and rubbed His head, and his face hurt Mrs. Whipple's feelings." He doesn't cry and it is interesting that it becomes an issue of her feeling. She honestly believes that "He don't get hurt." At least until the end when she does see Him cry. Then she glimpses the truth.

In Chelsea's blog and in class, the subject of keeping up appearances (to borrow from Chelsea) came up. Although His mother is undoubtedly trying to put on a good face for the neighbors, I definitely think that there is more to it. On the first read, it was obvious that the mother was worried about what everyone thought about her family and, consequently, nearly all her painstaking efforts to show how much she loved her disabled son were nothing more than an act. The second time I read this, though, I got a slightly different impression. Although she was, to a degree, attempting to please the neighbors, I think she was mostly just trying to convince herself that she had feelings for her son that she obviously did not really have. I'm sure that she desperately wanted to have genuine motherly feelings for Him, but she simply didn't. How hard would it be for a mother to have a child she loved less than the others? To compensate for her lack of motherly affection for Him, she tried to convince herself that "she loved her second son[...]better than she loved the other two children put together" (49). I don't know of any mother who would admit that she loved one child over the other, let alone announce it to anyone who would listen. She did love the other two, and perhaps even felt guilty about loving them but not Him, and maybe that is why she made such a shocking statement.

Sara's Lame-O in Porter's Stories


Okay, so I am sorry that I seem to be only responding to Sara’s past blogs…the reason is that I want these blogs to have something to do with what I am planning on writing my paper on (and the symposium as well), and since most of the blogs on this topic are written by myself, I have had a hard time finding blogs that others have written about even the stories that I will be focusing on. Since Sara did these lame-o ones covering most of the stories we have read, I found that I wanted to reply to her idea of the stories.

So, Sara stated that both the wife and the husband consider themselves to be morally superior individuals, and therefore they are slightly more lame-o than okay. I think that I agree with this assessment. Though I am not so sure that I would consider them thinking they are morally superior. I know that the husband and the wife are being incredibly defensive as a person is wont to do when they are being attacked. The fact that the fight so easily escalates makes me believe that this is not the first (nor the last) fight of this kind. As I’ve said before, I really don’t think that the rope is the reason for the fight…it’s the fact that he thought of himself instead of thinking of her, but when she gets what she wants (her coffee…which shows that he really DOES love her because he walked all the way to get it…again), she is okay with him having something for himself (i.e.: the rope).

Does being defensive mean a person believes he/she is morally superior? I don’t know. That seems to be the take Sara took, which is fine. Though she didn’t really give any support to her claim, so I don’t know what her reasoning was (though I’m sure it was brilliant because it’s Sara). I am thinking that neither of them really thought they were morally superior, just maybe that they were annoyed at each other, or something. Maybe I should re-read the story with the sole purpose of finding how they could be morally superior. I suppose that the wife could think she is because the husband had (possibly) had an affair. She has never cheated on him (or at least that’s what her accusation implies because we generally avoid accusing someone of doing something we ourselves have done…though not always), so she could think she is “better” than he is because of it. However, I don’t think that is what she is getting at. I think the main issue for this couple is not that they are morally superior, but are, in fact, not able to trust each other. The wife is obviously jealous, whether anything ever really happened between her husband and another woman. If she weren’t unsure of their relationship, she wouldn’t have become so angry about the fact that he forgot the coffee. Of course, that is probably a lie. As someone in class stated once, it could just be because she hasn’t had her caffeine fix and is apt to freak out because her body needs it. Then again, I don’t see why Porter would write a story that shows a woman being mad at her husband only because she can’t get her caffeine fix. I really think it has more to do with the trust/love issue.

Sara’s >“The Lame-o in Porter’s Stories”
Sara says that Maria is the morally superior person in the story, and I agree with that completely. However, she doesn’t really think she is “lame-o” because she doesn’t “kill the Maria Rosa because she holds herself higher or to rid the world of the sin Maria and Juan had committed; she does it out of grief and jealousy.” While I agree that grief and jealousy are part of the reason that Maria commits murder, I think it has a lot more to do with the institution of marriage itself. The fact that they were married in the church is a big thing for this couple. It seems as if their marriage should be on a higher playing field because they were married in the church instead of behind it. So I think that Maria really does hold herself to a higher standard, at least when it comes to her marriage. Perhaps she doesn’t believe that her marriage should be affected by things like adultery, etc. because her marriage is supposed to be a sacred thing. So maybe she’s grieving over the loss of sanctity of her marriage, but I really think that she is a “lame-o” because she wants to do what is morally right, but she then murders someone. However, she does murder Maria Rosa in order to “save her marriage.” Everything was fine before Maria Rosa came along, and perhaps she was hoping that it would all be fine again once Maria Rosa came along.

As a side note, Juan also talks of how his marriage is different than other marriages. He mentions that he cannot hit his wife and put her in his place because he was married in the church. He likes the fact that he can tell Maria Rosa what to do and hit her and all of that because he doesn’t worry that God will strike him dead for doing so. He isn’t really a lame-o though because he doesn’t hold himself morally superior, he simply recognizes that his marriage is supposed to be on a higher level.

Josie's comments on A Good Man Is Hard To Find stirred some thoughts.

I'm with Rachel, in her blog, trying to figure out the Misfit. When I read that the Misfit could not remember what he'd done wrong but said "it was no mistake" and that they had papers saying what he'd done coupled with the fact that the shrink said that what he'd done is killed his father when the Misfit says his father died in the 1919 (WWI) flu epidemic, I came to the conclussion that he murdered someone (not really his father) who in some way represented his father. The Misfit simply did not understand what was the psychologist's reason for motive in the killing. This is supported by the information we are given regarding his relationship with his father: "My daddy said I was a different breed of dog from my brothers and sisters. 'You know. . . it's some that can live their whole life out without asking about it and it's others has to know whyit is, and this boy is one of the latters. He's going to be into everything.'" I got the general impression that he was singled out by his father and perhaps judged and treated like a dog or in a way the Misfit has not been able to deal with. It makes it all the more interesting to note his reaction to the Grandmother's recognition of him as "one of [her] babies." In so doing she touches him and "the Misfit sprang back as if a snade had bitten him and shot her three times through the chest...." It seems that psychologist's explaination for motive has played out again in the Grandmother's case. I'm wondering if anyone else see's it this way?
I'm wondering what you all make of some other things. Like the writting the Misfit seems to be doing in the dirt. Do you think it is reminisant of Christ's writing in the sand? And if so, what are the implications? I see the Grandmother as a sinner as well. She lies- just little white lies like the hidden panel lie that is in the old house and exagerates like saying the car rolled twice. She is a hypocrite, like when she points out that when she was young "children were more respectful" in every sense and then points out the "pickaninny" which undermines her statement as her genereation were probably the most disrespectful of black people and she obviously still is. And she even deny's Jesus as the Christ when she says "Maybe He didn't raise the dead" in order to protect herself. I'm intriged this reading with the statement the Misfit makes on p.150:

I found out the crime don't matter. You can do one thing or you can do
another, kill a man or take his tire off his car, because sooner or later
you're going to forget what it was you done and just be punished for
it.

I also want to know what you think of her saying "I just know your a good man" and the Misfit reacting with "Nome, I ain't a good man," yet she doesn't give this idea up. It is interesting to me that after he says this he puts on the black hat. I know we've talked in class about the black hat and the big deal that was made over it, I just can't help but apply the western or cowboy literature applications of white hat, goodguy; black hat, bad guy. If this even applies, what do you make (if anything) of the grandmother's navy blue hat with white violets?

I'm wondering who is trying to save or help who, the Grandmother who is saying "pray, pray," which I can't help thinking is what she (or I in her place would be doing) should be doing. Or the Misfit who by holding a gun to her is encouraging her to say "I know your a good man," which is not true but the point is that she is not judging or condeming him or others as she recognizes (even if it's just out of selfpreservation) that grace makes them equal, all good if they only confess. I'm wondering I the Misfit has, in a way, confessed to her? The comment the Misfit makes: "No pleasure but meanness," I'm wondering about too. Is the pleasure he finds what I have just mentioned, that this woman is calling him "a good man" and perhaps seeing him with that potential? Or does't it just simply fit or make up for life's (and his own) seemingly unballanced punishments?

Like Rachel, I was also disappointed by the fact that there were not blog entries about "A Good Man is Hard to Find." I guess our blog just wasn't up and running that early in the semester. Bummer. Anyways, since this was the second time I've read this story, I also found myself paying closer attention to the Misfit. Rachel said in her blog that the first time around, she envisioned the Misfit as a younger man. I did the same thing, although I didn't classify him as ignorant. It blatantly states in the story that "he was an older man than the other two. His hair was just beginning to gray" (146) so I don't know why we pictured him as so much younger. He seemed, to me, to be the leader in a gang of rebellious kids. Envisioning him as an older man sheds a new light on this for me; although I know he is dangerous (since I have read this before and know what's coming), he seems to be more dangerous, if that's possible, as an older, educated man than he would be as a younger man. I guess this is partly due to the fact that he is experienced, and, as an older convict, likely has more numerous crimes under his belt than when he was younger. I missed it before, but O'Connor may have been suggesting that he may have killed other "folks" just prior to encountering this family. After he apologizes for his shirtless-ness, he says "we borrowed these (clothes) from some folks we met" (149). While this is merely conjecture, I would be willing to bet that those "folks" met a similar fate as Bailey's family. After all, doesn't the Misfit "borrow" Bailey's shirt after he is shot in cold blood in the forest?

Another thing I failed to recognize on our first read was the Misfit's repeated statement that "children make me nervous" (146). I wondered why he would shoot the children, especially the infant, when they presented very little threat to him and he had nothing to gain by killing them; the baby wasn't even old enough to testify against him. Perhaps his nervousness arises from the fact that children are blatanty honest and may not recognize him for what he is: a very real and dangerous threat. For example, rather than being afraid of these strangers, the first thing June Star says to the Misfit is " 'What are you telling US what to do for?' " They intimidate him more than any of the adults, which is why, I believe, he makes the choice to kill every last one of them.