Being ignored, unloved or even abused as a child can cause many problems later in your life and can even give you a flawed personality.  This parental negligence or even self-habit can cause a person to develop a changed personality and become a severely damaged person as a whole.  The sort of people that fit this profile can be portrayed in the short stories of Flannery O’Connor and William Faulkner.  Their characters come from the southern gothic genre of writing in “A Good Man is Hard to Find”, “A Rose for Emily” and “The Life You Save May Be Your Own”.  In these three short stories the existence of damaged characters with flawed personalities is present in The Misfit, Emily and even Mr. Shiftlet.

            Our first damaged character, The Misfit, has a flawed personality due to his troubled past.  Following him from the past, the Misfit is haunted by the fact that authorities think he murdered his own father.  “What I had done was kill my daddy but I known that for a lie” O’Connor (9) the Misfit said as he told of his troubled past and how he was falsely convicted.  This is how The Misfit came to be such a damaged character in the first place and started to murder and do the things he does.  Just by observing his non-existent emotions after murdering his victims, anyone could come to the conclusion that he is a psychopath with a flawed personality.  This flawed personality he has influences his actions in a reprehensible way.  “The

Misfit sprang back…and shot her three times.” (10) in a way that only a crazy person would, as his personality led him to kill the grandmother.  The Misfit kills the grandmother going along with his belief that there is “No pleasure but meanness” (10). 

            Portraying the southern gothic genre perfectly, O’Connor set a cripple with a flawed personality as Mr. Shiftlet, our next damaged character.  Mr. Shiftlet being a homeless cripple obviously sustained childhood tragedy and continued trouble through his life even before he set foot on Ms. Crater’s front porch.  This makes Mr. Shiftlet a damaged character in the sense that he is impaired physically and is looking for a sense of worth or purpose.   “I’d give a fortune to live where I could see me a sun do that every evening” (49) said Mr. Shiftlet as he yearned for a place to belong and be needed.  Even though this seems normal, the definition of damaged says that a person who is damaged is flawed or spoiled in worth or efficiency which Mr. Shiftlet has both of.  “He judged the car to be about a 1928 or ’29 Ford” (49) says O’Connor as she describes Mr. Shiftlet secretly deceiving Ms. Crater in thinking he is lost and looking for purpose while all he really wants is the car.  This side of Mr. Shiftlet is shifty and evil as he uses her to get what he wants.  Mr. Shiftlet’s flawed personality influences his actions to take advantage of Ms. Crater as he continues to fit the profile of being a damaged character.

            In the last short story, “A Rose for Emily”, the southern gothic genre was portrayed most heavily in the scenario of an old negro woman who stayed in her old dusty home dying and withering away.  This being old and dying added to the theme of Emily being a damaged character on top of loneliness and a sickly attitude towards dead friends and family.  Walking towards Emily’s home, the “whole town went to her funeral” Faulkner (307) so that they could show their respect for a fallen elder.  Being widely respected and speculated by the whole town, everyone knew why Emily had finally died.  Emily died not just of natural old age, but of sadness from her passed father and husband Homer Barron, and her own personality which kept her living in an old, dusty, depressing home that she felt comfortable in, but made her sick at the same time.  “She was sick for a long time” (311) the village said as they observed her withering away in her own home just like her personality always led her to do.   Her personality influenced her greatly in life and inevitably led her to death as well.    

            The existence of damaged characters is truly evident in these southern gothic based short stories, as The Misfit, Emily and Mr. Shiftlet portray their flawed personalities and resulting actions.  They all have different reasons for being damaged characters, whether it is abuse as a child or tragedies and problems early on in life.  These southern gothic characters have different problems but their resulting derangement is similar.  They all have flawed personalities like Emily being too reticent and grotesque, Mr. Shiftlet being too deceiving and depressed with his own life and “The Misfit” being too unemotional and violent.  Having major flaws in your personality can be classified as being a damaged character or person.  This existence of damaged characters in these short stories completes their mood of the Southern Gothic genre.