Monday, September 8, 2008
the wart hog from hell
Upon reading Revelation, what stuck out to me was the idea of being defined by what you are not. Mrs. Turpin defines herself by what she is not, she has worth because she is not white trash or low class. It is not because of the things she does (because as we can see when she has her interaction with the cotton pickers, she is not very good at being genuine, or empathetic) but rather she is a good person because she, like the old woman in A Good Man is Hard to Find, has clean clothes, and a fulfills her 'duty' as a white Christian woman which is seemingly to act polite abut think poorly of those around you. So when the girl on the office calls her a wart hog from hell, she is shaken because it gives her a set definition and strips her of her identity. When the woman is defined by the ugly fat girl, with the bad disposition, it completely changes her world. This is telling at the end when she has her revelation everyone goes up to heaven, and her group, in fact, is last.
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Well said. As is often the case, people attempt to bury their negative qualities with a series of rules and/or criteria that defines them as a good person. Of course, this is helped by a biased self-perception that pretty much all of us have.
In my opinion, the girl in the waiting room affects her so much not because she offers new information, but rather she pierces through her protective shell and digs into the core of her worst fears and qualities.
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