“Good Country People” by Flannery O’Connor is an excellent example of irony in literature. From beginning to end it has a steady demonstration of irony, much of it implied in the title of the story, “Good Country People.” As the story opens, we meet Mrs. Freeman, wife of the hired hand. She and her husband have been working for Mrs. Hopewell for four years. “The reason for her keeping them so long was that they were not trash. They were ‘Good Country People,’” according to Mrs. Hopewell (396). Ironically one of the first things we learn about Mrs. Freeman is that her previous employer has called her the nosiest woman ever to walk the earth. Then, as the story progresses, we learn she has a special fondness for the details of secret infections, hidden deformities, assaults upon children. It seems that for a good country person she has a vicious curiosity in the macabre. She particularly enjoys hearing all the details of how Hulga had her leg literally blasted off in a hunting accident. In affect, O’Connor exposes a cynical and ironic outlook of Hulga in “Good Country People” that is told throughout the story.

After dinner Manley Pointer secretly asks Hulga to go on a picnic with him the next day. She agrees and during the night she plans to seduce him. She imagines that she easily seduces him and that then, “of course, she had to reckon with his remorse” (404). Being of superior intellect she imagines that she takes his remorse in hand and changes it into a deeper understanding of life. She would take all his shame away and turn it into something useful. In the ultimate display of irony the tables are turned. Hulga is the one seduced by what she perceives as an innocent Bible salesman. Then after she has totally submitted to him and allowed him to see and remove her artificial leg. Manley Pointer reveals his true character, that of a sleazy, but cunning atheist. At the same time, Hulga is exposed as a girl whose innocence sharply contradicts the air of superior intellect she provides. Due to this, ironically Hulga becomes the one that is forced into a deeper understanding of life. Paradoxically, Manley Pointer in a symbolic way has taken her shame away by taking her artificial leg, although he had no plans of doing her any good. True to the irony of his being “Good Country People” Manley Pointer has no intentions of helping Hulga deal with her remorse.

As we first meet Manley Pointer he is trying to sell Mrs. Hopewell a Bible. When

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