RE: Names

Yes, I also thought that there must be something big going on with the names. In addition to those you have greatly explained, Manley Pointer is also a very odd name. What, if anything, is so manly about him? And also, I am suspecting that in O'Connor's South, it would have been very rude to point, so here is this person described as being so nice and simple while at the same time having a very rude name. What's he pointing at, figuratively? Could O'Connor be using his character to point to what's wrong with the world? (i.e. he's a charlatan, he's putting on a front) Also, I noticed something interesting about Joy/Hulga. We all know what the character chooses to call herself: Hulga, and we also know that the mother still calls her Joy. That's pretty straightforward, but what about O'Connor's narrative voice? The narrator seems to be shifting back and forth from calling her Joy to calling her Hulga. There seems to be something of a rhythm, and I am wondering if this flip-flopping is just random or if it indeed means something. After we know that the character changed her name legally, the narrator begins calling her Hulga except for when we get a window into Mrs. Hopewell's point of view. We get the first instance of this at the bottom of page 267, and this would make sense, since she continues to call her Joy, when we get her thoughts and beliefs, it makes sense to use Joy. Then during the initial meeting scene with Manley Pointer, the dinner scene, the narrator refers to her as Joy every time (pgs. 270-273), even when we are not "in Mrs. Hopewell's head." Then as if flipping a switch, on pg. 274 we get "Hulga had cracked her two eggs...," and for the rest of the story, the narrator's voice only uses Hulga or "the girl." Joy is never used again. I am reminded of "The River" and how there as well, the narrator seemed to be making a very conscious choice of calling the boy not by his God-given name. So what is going on here? On page 273, we get the scene in which the girl and Manley Pointer are talking at the gate, and Mrs. Hopewell is pondering what they are talking about. This feels like a crucial moment. Mrs. Hopewell is astonished that they are talking, and it is the next scene the next morning that the shift in name occurs for the narrative voice. Like Mrs. Hopewell, I am left wishing to hear the particulars of that conversation. Did the character change, and is O'Connor showing us this by the conscious shift in appellation? And since "Joy" is obviously a hopeful, very positive name while we know that "Hulga" is meant to be an ugly name, is this change in character supposed to be a negative one? Did the character maybe fall from grace here? Is this supposed to mark when the character begins to give in to Manley Pointer, who will eventually be her downfall? It is almost like the character is losing her "joy" to succumb to the full embodiment of Hulga, meant to be ugly, and this can be a foreshadowing of Manley Pointer's putting one over on her. I was wondering if anyone else noticed this, and again, it may be a small insignificant detail, but I think we have read enough O'Connor now not to trust any such details to randomness.