Practice & Participation Content

1. On Tuesday 3/5 we hit the surface-level questions for O’Connor’s “Good Man,” using the elements of short fiction (pp 131-37) in AL. For Thursday 3/7, we’ll be digging a little deeper in “Good Man,” incorporating the critical excerpts following “Good Man,” including O’Connor’s “From Mystery and Manners” and Stephen Bandy’s “From ‘One of My Babies’: The Misfit and the Grandmother.” Your next assigned essay is a 1250-1500-word researched critical analysis of “Good Man,” in which you’ll stake an interpretative claim based on the undecided issues listed below, defend this interpretation w/ your own logical reasoning, evidence from “Good Man,” and 3-4 outside sources (which can include the two excerpts from AL). The rough draft for this is due by class time 3/21 (the final draft is due 3/28 by 11:59 PM).
   Pages 175-178 of AL offer a brief overview of how to research outside sources for literary analyses. You will follow the instructions and search engines here to locate your 3-4 sources for a critical interpretation of “Good Men.” The rest of chapter 7 contains explanations for documenting your research sources (according to MLA format), within the essay itself (parenthetically) and afterwards in your Works Cited. Make sure you have covered chapter 7 before Tues, 3/19, as we’ll be covering the basics prior to your rough draft peer edit on Thurs 3/21.
   With a partner or group of two, I want you to brainstorm the following issues, determining which issue you plan to pursue for your critical analysis. I’d like to see a 1-2 paragraph free write on your chosen issue, a solid-well-constructed main claim, the counter interpretation for your claim, and a preliminary outline of your supporting claims incorporating logical reasoning, details/quotes from the story, and key evidence (quotes, paraphrased ideas, etc) from your outside sources.
   Unresolved questions/ambiguities for “Good Man”:
   1) Considering none of O’Connor’s characters qualify as truly “good” people, which character has more redeeming qualities (in light of Biblical principles), based on dialogue and actions–the Grandmother OR the Misfit (bearing in mind O’Connor’s own tendency to want to idealize the Grandmother as a “redemptive” figure, based on her excerpt “From Mystery and Manners”; in other words, do you AGREE OR DISAGREE w O’Connor?)
   2) The critic Stephen Bandy proposes a possible interpretation for “Good Man’s” cryptic ending, which ends w/ the Grandmother’s last plea for mercy from the Misfit: “Why you’re one of my babies. You’re one of my own children!” Do you agree w/ Bandy that the Grandmother is “resorting to her only remaining weapon: motherhood” (754) to attempt to save her own skin, OR is this one final appeal to his “good” Christian decency (not based on a Christian world view he claimed for himself, but one Grandmother projected on him)?
   3) O’Connor actually offers us more background on the Misfit’s past history than any other character, including the Grandmother. Based on what he tells the Grandmother, and repetitious references to his “embarrassment,” would you argue that O’Connor characterizes the Misfit as primarily the victim of a broken legal system that falsely imprisoned him, turning him into a cold-blooded murderer, OR as the product of his own poor choices (including imprisonment, rejection of the Christian faith)?