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Definition of Foreshadowing
Foreshadowing is a literary device in which authors hint at plot developments that don't actually occur until later in the story. Foreshadowing can be achieved directly or indirectly, by making... read full definition
Foreshadowing is a literary device in which authors hint at plot developments that don't actually occur until later in the story. Foreshadowing can be achieved... read full definition
Foreshadowing is a literary device in which authors hint at plot developments that don't actually occur until later in the... read full definition
Foreshadowing
Explanation and Analysis—Meeting the Misfit:
At the beginning of the story, the Grandmother warns her son Bailey that, if they decide to go to Florida on their family road trip, they might run into an escaped convict called the Misfit, foreshadowing their eventual meeting with him:
“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.”
Here the grandmother tells Bailey that she’s aware of the Misfit’s plans to go to Florida and that she “wouldn’t take [her] children in any direction with a criminal like that aloose in it,” implying that it is possible they could run into him if they journey there. By presenting the grandmother in a near-hysterical way (she is not showing her son the newspaper but “rattling” it at him), O’Connor is encouraging readers not to take her seriously, the same way that Bailey does not take her seriously. And yet her worries turn out to be well-founded, as they do run into the Misfit during their car ride south.
This moment is therefore also an example of situational irony, given that readers expect the story to go one way (for the family not to run into the Misfit) and it goes the other (not only do they run into him, but he kills them, the violent outcome that the grandmother likely feared). There is also a second layer of irony, which is the fact that it was the grandmother who forced the family to take the back road that led them to the Misfit, thereby unknowingly doing what she swore she would never do. Here O’Connor highlights the grandmother’s hypocrisy—while she believes herself to be acting morally throughout the story, she consistently brings harm to those around her, as well as to herself.
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Explanation and Analysis—The Grandmother’s Death:
In an example of both foreshadowing and situational irony, the grandmother decides, at the beginning of the story, to dress up for her family’s road trip so that, in the event of an accident, she would die looking like “a lady.” The following passage captures this ironic foreshadowing:
[T]he grandmother had on a navy blue straw sailor hat with a bunch of white violets on the brim and a navy blue dress with a small white dot in the print. Her collars and cuffs were white organdy trimmed with lace and at her neckline she had pinned a purple spray of cloth violets containing a sachet. In case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady.
Here the grandmother intentionally dons her best apparel—a sailor hat with flowers on the brim, a matching dress with lacy details, and a fancy flower pin—so that, should the family get into a car accident, “anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady.” This small moment communicates that the grandmother prioritizes appearances above all else while also foreshadowing the accident that the family does have, as well as the fact that she will end up dying on the side of the road during this road trip.
The situational irony here is that, while the grandmother does end up dying in these clothes, she does not die looking presentable. Not only does the accident ruin her hat and clothes, but she is killed in a ditch far from any main road. This would make it very unlikely for someone to find her body, and, if they did, it would be in an even more “unpresentable” and decayed state. This ironic plot twist subtly communicates that the grandmother would have been wiser to put her time into living a good, moral life, rather than prioritizing looking like she did.
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