Flannery OConnors `Good Country People`

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Good Country People

Flannery 's Characters as Transformative

This essay will delve into the life of Flannery O 'Connor not only as it is told biographically but as her life relates and is reiterated in the stories she writes . By using O 'Connor 's fiction as a backdrop to her life , the essay will focus on the bizarre characterization of the protagonists of O 'Connor 's stories as much as O 'Connor herself was a very unique person . Thus , O 'Connor will be

exemplified as being explained through her characters such as in the story Good Country People

O 'Connor was a great user of allegory in her stories . As O 'Connor in her life was an introvert most of her characters are gregarious such as in Good Country People and the character Hulga . Hulga denies herself first in the story by the changing of her name from Joy to Hulga which signifies O 'Connor 's own contempt of falsities . She is stating through the character Hulga that people are prone to be blind in areas in which they should be keeping both eyes open . She states this in regard to events in her own life such as growing up Catholic in a mostly Protestant neighborhood . Hulga is blind to her own personality and what she is capable of doing and by changing her name she is trying to rewrite her own history . O 'Connor as a write can sympathize with this notion as through her characters O 'Connor is trying to find her own identity

O 'Connor 's true niche in writing lay with the creation of the tragic hero . She felt that she herself was a tragic hero since she at once had to overcome a physical malady as well as remain static because of that malady and thereby not enjoy the world nor prove to the world the capabilities of the self herself . Her second belief was that the world is charged with God (Wikipedia . She was unapologetic in her writing style and the `grotesque ' characters with which she filled her stories Each character of O 'Connor 's fiction brought on a fundamental change for the character . When Hulga changes her name and then meets Manly Pointer and goes through a very quick transformation

The rejection of the name Joy to the embrace of the name Hulga reveals for the audience that Hulga does not enjoy herself but expects life to be filled with disappointment and in fact has been taught as much from family and neighbors . Upon meeting Manly Pointer Hulga , Hulga is contemptuous and sees herself as better then him whom she describes as simple and dim witted yet agrees to go on a picnic with him in to show him a deeper meaning to life (Hulga is hung up on suffering and sadomasochistic fantasies . In fact , Hulga is the one who is ignorant about the world as Manly Pointer demonstrates a series of hoodwinking events in which...