Foreshadowing in "A Good Man"

In Flannery O’Connor’s story “A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” O’Connor successfully uses the literary technique of foreshadowing to enhance and to support her story. Although O’Connor frequently uses foreshadowing, she is able to mask its overwhelming presence in the story through her crafty use of irony and humor. Right at the beginning of the story, O’Connor foreshadows the family’s encounter with The Misfit. While trying to convince her son Bailey for the family to travel to east Tennessee instead of Florida, the grandmother angrily says, “I wouldn’t take my children in any direction with a criminal like that aloose in it. I couldn’t answer to my conscience if I did” (1). Already, in the first paragraph of the story, O’Connor is able to plant the possibility, or likelihood, of an encounter with the Misfit in the reader’s mind. This quote also is a perfect example of O’Connor’s subtle use of irony. Looking back at these two lines when the events of the story are known already, it is fairly obvious to see the irony in the grandmother’s words. Although she claims that she wouldn’t take her children near a criminal, it is her fault that her family crossed paths with the Misfit because of her desire to see a nonexistent house.

O’Connor continues with her early prefiguring of the encounter with the Misfit in dialogue between the grandmother and her grandson, John Wesley. When the grandmother asks John what he would do if he was caught by the Misfit, he bravely replies, “I’d smack his face” (6). This is yet another calculated effort by the author to reference the meeting with the Misfit, but again O’Connor uses humor and irony to partially diverge the reader from this sign of the future. The humorous part of this statement is that a young boy, John, claims that he would smack the face of a full-grown escaped angry convict. It is also funny and ironic that once the Misfit is identified, John Wesley is very quiet and subdued, and instead of smacking the Misfit he joins his family who was “huddled together in front of [the Misfit]” (90).

John Wesley is also the source of another instance of foreshadowing later in the story. Once the family has crashed their car and met the unidentified strangers, John pryingly asks one of the strangers “What you got that gun for? Whatcha gonna do with the gun?” (78) As a matter of fact, that man is going to kill you with that gun, John. O’Connor foreshadows the use of the gun through John’s questioning, but again, is able almost sneak it in without making it too apparent. Through O’Connor’s earlier characterization of John Wesley as an annoying, loud, and curious young boy, she is able to make the reader believe that this was just a typical childish question by an immature and nosy boy. And again, knowing the outcome of the story, it is ironic that John is asking the man who is going to kill him what he is doing with a gun.

These aforementioned examples of foreshadowing are surely not the only ones in the story, and with an abundance of time it would be easy to spot and discuss many more examples. Still, through her wonderful and effective use of foreshadowing, Flannery O’Connor is able to make her story fun and interesting to read and analyze. (565)