Student Question
Find expressive meanings in "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" through literary devices like chiasmus, repetition, ellipses, and litotes.
Quick answer:
In "A Good Man Is Hard to Find," O'Connor uses repetition over and over again for effect. A poignant use that expresses the grandmother's grief and despair is "Bailey Boy, Bailey Boy!" O'Connor employs ellipses to indicate interruption and litotes as a speech pattern of the Misfit, as in "Don’t see no sun but don’t see no cloud neither."
The grandmother uses repetition in the opening paragraph of the story to try to impress on her son, Bailey's, mind the danger of the Misfit, who is on the loose:
“Now look here, Bailey,” she said, “see here, read this,” and she stood with one hand on her thin hip and the other rattling the newspaper at his bald head. “Here this fellow that calls himself The Misfit is aloose from the Federal Pen and headed toward Florida and you read here what it says he did to these people. Just you read it. I wouldn’t take my children in any direction with a criminal like that aloose in it."
The grandmother repeats the words "read" and "aloose" to try to get her son's attention. Ironically, she is right about the Misfit's danger, but her son utterly ignores her words. From the start of the story, O'Connor has drawn attention...
Unlock This Answer Now
Start your 48-hour free trial and get ahead in class. Boost your grades with access to expert answers and top-tier study guides. Thousands of students are already mastering their assignments—don't miss out. Cancel anytime.
Already a member? Log in here.
to what will become the main drama of the story, at the same time encouraging us to follow Bailey's lead in ignoring it.
One of the most powerful uses of repetition, which conveys the grandmother's sorrow and despair, occurs when she cries out her son's name twice: “Bailey Boy, Bailey Boy!”
Repetition occurs many times in the story and coincides with the use of ellipses as the grandmother's voice trails off:
“Pray, pray,” the grandmother began, “pray, pray ...”
The ellipsis indicates the grandmother's thoughts trailing off, but they also indicate the Misfit interrupting her with his own dreamy musing. He calls her to "attention to him by a steady stare," wanting her to listen to his story of being sent to prison. However, her repeated advice that he should pray—and the ellipsis—suggests he does not have her full attention.
The Misfit is given to using litotes, which is saying something in a roundabout way, usually through negation. For instance, the Misfit says,
Don’t see no sun but don’t see no cloud neither.
In other words, he means it is a gray day, fitting symbolism for the "gray area" the family is in at this moment, hanging between life and death, but he uses a roundabout way of saying it.