A Good Man Is Hard to Find

A Good Man Is Hard to Find es un cuento de la escritora norteamericana Flannery O´Connor (1925 - 1964) de 1953. El comienzo de la historia es muy bueno, entretenido, pero lo realmente controvertido es el final, algo que pocos esperaban…

En vocabulario buscamos aloose y apricots. Más abajo ponemos unos párrafos en inglés.

 

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…

 

A Good Man is Hard to Find

Presentación

Bailey, de Atlanta, se prepara para llevar a su familia de vacaciones a Florida. La madre de Bailey (conocida sólo como "la abuela" a lo largo de la historia) quiere ir al este de Tennessee y advierte a Bailey que un convicto llamado Misfit ha escapado de la prisión y se dirige hacia Florida. La familia, incluido Bailey, su nieto John Wesley, su nieta June Star y su nieto pequeño, atendido por su nuera, la ignoran. Cuando salen a la mañana siguiente, la abuela ocupa el asiento trasero del coche de la familia, elegantemente vestida para que, si muere en un accidente, pueda ser reconocida como una dama sureña. Ella esconde al gato de la familia, Pitty Sing, en una canasta entre sus piernas, porque no quiere dejarlo solo en casa…

Paragraphs

THE GRANDMOTHER didn't want to go to Florida. She wanted to visit some of her connections in east Tennessee and she was seizing at every chance to change Bailey's mind. Bailey was the son she lived with, her only boy. He was sitting on the edge of his chair at the table, bent over the orange sports section of the Journal. "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. I couldn't answer to my conscience if I did."

Bailey didn't look up from his reading so she wheeled around then and faced the children's mother, a young woman in slacks, whose face was as broad and innocent as a cabbage and was tied around with a green head-kerchief that had two points on the top like rabbit's ears. She was sitting on the sofa, feeding the baby his apricots out of a jar. "The children have been to Florida before," the old lady said. "You all ought to take them somewhere else for a change so they would see different parts of the world and be broad. They never have been to east Tennessee."

The children's mother didn't seem to hear her but the eight-year-old boy, John Wesley, a stocky child with glasses, said, "If you don't want to go to Florida, why dontcha stay at home?" He and the little girl, June Star, were reading the funny papers on the floor.

"She wouldn't stay at home to be queen for a day," June Star said without raising her yellow head.

"Yes and what would you do if this fellow, The Misfit, caught you?" the grandmother asked.

"I'd smack his face," John Wesley said.

"She wouldn't stay at home for a million bucks," June Star said. "Afraid she'd miss something. She has to go everywhere we go."

"All right, Miss," the grandmother said. "Just remember that the next time you want me to curl your hair."

June Star said her hair was naturally curly.

The next morning the grandmother was the first one in the car, ready to go. She had her big black valise that looked like the head of a hippopotamus in one corner, and underneath it she was hiding a basket with Pitty Sing, the cat, in it. She didn't intend for the cat to be left alone in the house for three days because he would miss her too much and she was afraid he might brush against one of the gas burners and accidentally asphyxiate himself. Her son, Bailey, didn't like to arrive at a motel with a cat.

She sat in the middle of the back seat with John Wesley and June Star on either side of her. Bailey and the children's mother and the baby sat in front and they left Atlanta at eight forty-five with the mileage on the car at 55890. The grandmother wrote this down because she thought it would be interesting to say how many miles they had been when they got back. It took them twenty minutes to reach the outskirts of the city… (From A Good Man Is Hard to Find, by Flannery O´Connor)

Vocabulario

Aloose: Free from restraints.

Apricots: damascos.

Artículos relacionados

Su escritura refleja también su propia fe católica, y con frecuencia examina cuestiones de moralidad y ética… Flannery O´Connor

Bajo el socialismo todo esto, por supuesto, será alterado. No va a haber personas viviendo en lugares fétidos, criando chicos enfermos y hambrientos en medio de lugares imposibles y… El alma del hombre

Buda-Pesth seems a wonderful place, from the glimpse which I got of it from the train and the little I could walk through the streets. I feared to go very far from the station, as… The Journey to Dracula

 

Si visitas Salta puedes alojarte en un departamento completamente amoblado y que alquilamos a los seguidores del blog con un descuento especial… (booking.com)