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Lessons learned from writing a personal narrative
Lessons learned from writing a personal narrative
Lessons learned from writing a personal narrative
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Some people may say that human nature is to be greedy, whereas others say greed is developed over time. Whichever way it is, needless to say both Mrs. Loisel and General Zaroff in The Necklace and Most Dangerous Game, natures were to be greedy. Bored of simple things Mrs. Loisel longed for a life of a queen. One day she got to live out her dream, she got a fancy dress, but it didn’t end there, she wanted more, she wanted jewels, which she then lost. Bored of hunting General Zaroff invented his own kind of hunting where he hunted humans, which led to his battle of life or death with Rainsford. Even though in both the Most Dangerous Game and The Necklace, the antagonists, Mrs. Loisel and General Zaroff, experienced greed, and boredom of their …show more content…
lives, and neither got away with their actions, the two antagonists differed in their conflicts. Both the antagonists, Mrs. Loisel and General Zaroff, in The Necklace and The Most Dangerous Game, grew bored of their lives, which led to them wanting more; more lavish items, and a more dangerous game. General Zaroff was a renowned hunter, who grew up with hunting, and could kill anything. However, this was the problem, because soon hunting became boring to him. “The general smiled. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Hunting tigers ceased to interest me some years ago. I exhausted their possibilities, you see. No thrill left in tigers, no real danger. I live for danger, Mr. Rainsford,’” (MDG). A dangerous animal, even a tiger, was too easy for General Zaroff to kill. With no real challenge he became bored of life, since he lives for danger and nothing was dangerous to him. His boredom led to his greediness, “’But they are men,’ said Rainsford hotly. ‘Precisely,’ said the general. ‘That is why I use them. It gives me pleasure. They can reason, after a fashion. So they are dangerous,’”(MDG). Zaroff wanted animal who could reason, because the ones that he had been hunting before relied on instinct rather than reason, which made them easy to kill. He then acted on his instinct or nature of being greedy by inventing a whole new version of hunting that is challenging. It was greedy, because for one he wanted more. Two, he only considered himself in the situation, not taking into account that he is affecting other people’s lives. Similarly, Mrs. Loisel lived a dull life in her eyes, with nothing to entertain her, “Her tastes were simple because she had never been able to afford any other, but she was as unhappy as though she had married beneath her…” (The Necklace). She could only have simple things and wanted new and better things that she couldn’t have, which made her discontent and bored of her life. She yearned for more, because she felt like she married beneath herself, as if she could’ve had more. Finally, she got the opportunity to live the way she had always envisioned for herself. She had gotten a dress, which should’ve been plenty, but it wasn’t, “’I'm utterly miserable at not having any jewels, not a single stone, to wear,’ she replied,” (The Necklace). Even after she got a dress, she wanted jewels. Mrs. Loisel was never content in what she had. Instead, she was greedy, and kept taking, when her husband Mr. Loisel was already giving up what he wanted for her. The characters in both stories were stultified of their lives and took from others to get what they wanted, without giving a thought as to how they are being greedy, and affecting others. Coinciding in some respects, The Necklace and The Most Dangerous Game differ in their type of conflict, and are on different ends of the spectrum in extremeness.
General Zaroff offers each of his victims two choices; to try to evade him in the hunt or to be immediately killed by Ivan, “’The choice rests entirely with you. But may I not venture to suggest that you will find my idea of sport more diverting than Ivan's?’” (MDG). Here General Zaroff is giving Rainsford the choice to go with Ivan, meaning that General Zaroff is challenging Rainsford to a hunt. Therefore, the conflict is person vs person, because the hunt(the conflict) is between two people. Whereas in The Necklace, the type of conflict is self vs self. Mrs. Loisel borrowed an expensive diamond necklace from her friend to wear to the ball. Later, she lost the necklace, “They searched in the folds of her dress, in the folds of the coat, in the pockets, everywhere. They could not find it,” (The Necklace). Mrs. Loisel lost the necklace, therefore it was her fault that she now must find or replace the necklace. Also, it was her own greed that caused her to have the necklace in the first place. On two different ends of extremeness, Rainsford finds himself in the middle of the hunt, trying to put off his doom for three days, until he has then won, “But the hope that was in Rainsford's brain when he climbed died, for he saw in the shallow valley that General Zaroff was still on his feet,” (MDG). Rainsford is running for …show more content…
his life, with General Zaroff on his toes, attempting to murder him. The conflict of The Most Dangerous game is at an extreme with Rainsford is running for his life, with General Zaroff on his toes, struggling between life and death. On the other end, the conflict of The Necklace is milder. Instead, when they lose the necklace Mrs. Loisel is put into debut, “Her husband worked in the evenings at putting straight a merchant's accounts, and often at night he did copying at two pence-halfpenny a page,” (The Necklace). Since they had acquired debut, Mr. and Mrs. Loisel had to work to pay it off. They had to work for many years, before they fully paid it off. However, them having to pay off debut as the conflict is not as extreme as the conflict of The Most Dangerous Game, where Rainsford is facing life or death, and they differ in type of conflict. In The Most Dangerous Game the conflict is person vs person, vs Th Necklace where the conflict is self vs self. The stories both end with the characters nearly get away with their conflicts, but events take a turn, and they both end up paying for their greed.
At the climax of The Most Dangerous Game, Rainsford in backed into a corner with the hounds close on his trail, there was only one way to escape the hunt, “Rainsford hesitated. He heard the hounds. Then he leaped far out into the sea,” (MDG). Rainsford leaps into the sea where he’ll mostly likely drown, leading General Zaroff to thinking that he is dead. He walks away thinking he will hunt humans again, and have no repercussions. Rainsford later comes back, and him and General decide to fight to the death, and whoever wins would get the bed, “He had never slept in a better bed, Rainsford decided,” (MDG). Rainsford slept in the bed, which means that he won the fight, and that Rainsford killed General. Now, General Zaroff could no longer kill innocent people for his own need of a challenging hunt, and he was also dealt the ultimate punishment for what he had done to him and others. After paying off her debuts, years later Mrs. Loisel runs into their friend that she borrowed the necklace from, “’You remember the diamond necklace you lent me for the ball at the Ministry?’ ‘Yes. Well?’ ‘Well, I lost it.’” (The Necklace). Mrs. Loisel spent years covering up her mistake, escaping her friend’s disappointment. This is until in the end the truth came, when her friend found out that she had replaced the necklace. Mrs. Loisel had borrowed
the necklace from her friend out of greed, "’I brought you another one just like it. And for the last ten years we have been paying for it. You realize it wasn't easy for us; we had no money,’” (The Necklace). Like Zaroff, she didn’t go unpunished for her greed. Mrs. Loisel worked years of hard labor to pay it off, forcing her to appreciate what she had before from further on. Neither could get away with their actions, although they got away with for years, and both paid for their greed.
“He compromised all the rest of his life, risked signing a note without even knowing whether he could meet it; and, frightened by the trouble yet to come, by the black misery that was about to fall upon him, by the prospect of all the physical privations and moral tortures that he was to suffer, he went to get the new necklace, laying upon the jeweler’s counter thirty-six thousand francs.”
The 2008 British drama film, “Slumdog Millionaire”, directed by Danny Boyle, and the short story, “The Necklace,” by Guy de Maupassant, have different settings and plot They share, however, similar cathartic themes showing the deception of appearances, and the journey from illusion to truth.
Groucho Marx once said” While money can’t buy you happiness, it certainly lets you choose your own form of misery.” People pretend to lose sight of what’s important. In the short story, “the Necklace” the women Mathilde Loisel feels a burden of her poverty and imagines a more extravagant existence. In “In La Riconada” all the gold was taken. The other short story, “King Midas”, was about a king who wished everything he touched turned into gold.
The Necklace is a great example of how our desires can create tragedy rather than happiness. Madame Forestier would have rather been idolized for her wealth instead of buying items that grant her survival. She says,”It’s just that I have no evening dress and so I can’t go to the party.” which explains well how she had a finite amount of money and thought material wealth was more important than happiness. If she only knew before that she would spend the next decade working off her debt, she would have never asked for the necklace and she would have had a happy life. Furthermore, wealth isn’t the only thing that brings happiness to a life.
The best and most memorable short stories are the ones that contain conflict. The most obvious form of conflict is man versus man, where there is an external conflict between two characters, or even an internal conflict within man himself. Within “The Most Dangerous Game”, the main character Rainsford meets General Zaroff, a fellow hunter who has invented a new game to hunt. When Rainsford finds out that the new game is humans, he is disgusted by the idea. Yet, when he is later hunted by the General, he begins to feel the thrill of having a battle of wits with his opponent. This stirs within him an inner conflict of thoughts contrary to the
The aspect of greed shows itself as the heart of the many immoral acts committed by fictional characters and real people. From Adam and Eve’s betrayal to Macbeth’s collapse portrays what greed can produce as a result: destruction. Whether it destroys one’s health, it inherently portrays as a force to the path of corruption. The Pardoner, from The Canterbury Tales, defines greed’s purpose. This includes how greed pulls them to degeneration. No matter how subtle the fall, it still brings to distasteful events for the characters from The Importance of Being Earnest. Although the characters differ, their obsessions with their immoral acts decline their personalities. Thus, the authors portray the characters’ greed, as a pernicious force that drives
The Conflicts of “The Most Dangerous Game” In order to create a story, there must be a decent conflict. Conflict helps shape the approach in which a story is going. A conflict can easily be defined as a clash of actions, ideas, desires, and wills. The conflicts in a story can help you differentiate the protagonist from the antagonist.
Sanger Rainsford has to overcome many obstacles he faces to not become what he fears, the hunted. When he is sprinting away from General Zaroff he has to fight the urge to quit, and he has to fight the battle of “The Most Dangerous Game.” He is running from the hounds, Ivan, and General Zaroff, when he arrives at a safe place he thinks about how close he was to becoming what he fears. Nevertheless, Sanger Rainsford out wits everything he has experienced and wins “The Most Dangerous Game.”
In The Hound of the Baskerville, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle displays the effects of the greed by causing Hugo to be selfish, letting Mr. Stapleton have everything that he wants, and causing Mr. Stapleton to be jealous of Sir Henry. Finally, greed has to do with wanting lots of money or material wealth, but it doesn’t necessarily only relates to money. Greed can be for anything but is most likely for food, money, possessive, power, fame, or status. Never be greedy because it can mess up your whole life like Mr. Stapleton and
Selfishness in The Necklace by Maupassant In Guy de Maupassant's, "The Necklace" all the characters in the story exhibit similar behavior by showing that they think of themselves rather than of others. A close look at the behavior of the characters in "The Necklace" reveals more than a story about a spoiled selfish woman, but what we see is a story about a whole society of selfish people. In "The Necklace" a woman named Mathilde lives a depressed life because she does not live the life style that she desires. She "was one of those pretty and charming women, born, as if by an error of destiny into a family of clerks and copyists.
In the short story “The Necklace”, the main character, Loisel, is a woman who dreams of greater things in her life. She is married to a poor clerk who tries his best to make her happy no matter what. In an attempt to try to bring happiness to his wife, he manages to get two invitations to a very classy ball, but even in light of this Loisel is still unhappy. Even when she gets a new dress she is still unhappy. This lasts until her husband suggests she borrows some jewelry from a friend, and upon doing so she is finally happy. Once the ball is over, and they reach home, Loisel has the horrible realization that she has lost the necklace, and after ten years of hard labor and suffering, they pay off debts incurred to get a replacement. The central idea of this story is how something small can have a life changing effect on our and others life’s. This idea is presented through internal and external conflicts, third person omniscient point of view, and the round-dynamic character of Loisel. The third person limited omniscient point-of-view is prevalent throughout this short story in the way that the author lets the reader only see into the main character’s thoughts. Loisel is revealed to the reader as being unhappy with her life and wishing for fancier things. “She suffered ceaselessly, feeling herself born for all the delicacies and all the luxuries.” (de Maupassant 887) When her husband tries to fancy things up, “she thought of dainty dinners, of shining silverware, of tapestry which peopled the walls…” (de Maupassant 887) As the story goes on her point of view changes, as she “now knew the horrible existence of the needy. She took her part, moreover all of a sudden, with heroism.” (de Maupassant 891) Having the accountability to know that the “dreadful debt must be paid.” (de Maupassant 891 ) This point-of-view is used to help the reader gain more insight to how Loisel’s whole mindset is changed throughout her struggle to pay off their debts. Maupassant only reveals the thoughts and feelings of these this main character leaving all the others as flat characters. Loisel is a round-dynamic character in that Maupassant shows how she thought she was born in the wrong “station”. “She dressed plainly because she could not dress well, but she was as unhappy as though she had really fallen from her proper station.
Since time immemorial, people have been trying to institutionalize moral values. love kindness, patience, contentment are just a few out of the plethora of positive traits. However, mankind being imperfect beings can never achieve perfection. Of all the vices that human possess, greed could be said to be the most influential. It is the distinct opposite of contentment and the very trait that has cause the fall of many countries. Perhaps most disturbing is that fact that greed has also torn apart countless families who would have otherwise been living in happiness. Indeed, one may say that greed is worthy to be one of the greatest sins. Yet there are those who proclaim that greed is necessary for mankind to evolve and rise above themselves. Such is the paradox of our time.
Greed is a natural consequence of trying to get the most for the least. From the beginning, humans have been greedy to the point where now it is part of being human to be greedy. There is no person on Earth that has never been greedy and there never will be. The first person who walks this planet without having ever been greedy will no longer be human. Greed is valuable to self, to society, and to our species. Humans act like a swarm, when everyone follows their own personal interests; we appear to be following an organized pattern. From chaos a perfect order is born. An order governed solely by greed.
The night of the ball came and Mathilde looked great; everyone admired her. The evening ended and everyone went home. Mathilde decided that she would look at herself in the mirror one last time before getting out of the clothes. When she did, she noticed the necklace that she admired so much was gone. Mathilde and her husband had to borrow thirty-six thousand francs from people they knew to buy another just like it so they could return it to the friend. Mathilde and her husband were deeply in debt. For ten years they worked day in and day out until finally the debt was paid off.
The conflict began when Mathilde attended a party wearing a necklace she borrowed from a rich friend, which was discovered lost by the end of the night. Mathilde finally got a glimpse into the life she believed she belonged to, but both she and her husband paid for it heavily for many years to come. The necklace she borrowed and lost served as a gateway into that world, and as a hasty exit out of it.