Question

"She would of been a good woman," The Misfit said, "if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life." Write a paragraph of at least 250 words describing your thoughts on what The Misfit meant by this statement about the grandmother and what O'Connor might be trying to say about people and good versus evil.

Answer 1

I'll give the idea in which to base your paragraph upon, but I'll leave it up to you to fill the 250 words count ;)

The Misfit meant that the grandmother would have been a good person if she was at gunpoint, figuratively meaning that she would've been a good person only if she knew someone would be judging her at all times. Her intentions were not to bee good for the sake of it, but to do something good because it would offer her something in return.

Answer 2

This phrase comes from the short story, "A good man is hard to find" written by Flannery O'Connor.

This tale was published in 1953 and accompanies a vacation trip of a grandmother with her family. The old lady would like the trip to be another destination and unsuccessfully try to persuade the family to go to Tennessee rather than Florida. From the beginning, it is clear that the grandmother is a difficult and stubborn person, and that her relatives only tolerate her out of necessity because she does not show kindness in her actions.

The Misfit speaks the phrase "She would have been a good woman, if she had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life." to describe that grandma's goodness is a false thing, a seeming thing that only comes when the old lady feels her actions are being watched by someone and this one will judge what she does as good or bad.