Choice and Regret in 'The Seventh Man': A Study

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In his story The Seventh Man, Harukis Murakami questions if people are truly able to make their own choices. People are often affected by the choices they do not make; as a result, a person may often feel they could have made the change their choice when it is too late. People blame themselves for the result, but is fate sometimes to blame? In The Seventh Mana youngten-year-old boy in which is the narrator, regrets a choice he did not make.A typhoon hit the narrator's home and everyone remains inside, protected from the storm until the storm has passed. Once the storm has passed the narrator gets permission to go outside and play. While outside the young boy decides to climb over the dyke, in which was protecting him from the storm, to join …show more content…

Daily life may go on, but haunting nightmares and fear tend to follow those who feel guilt. The narrator says “I readied myself for the moment the darkness the darkness would take me.” (212). to show that guilt will soon consume him and life will change as he knows it. Feeling guilt is a normal occurrence in the human mind, but being consumed by guilt, and later fear, results in mental pain for those who cannot mentally move on with their daily life. For those who feel this way, they have reoccurring visions of the haunting memories that make their way into a person’s daily life in the form of fear. People only allow guilt to enter their mind if they are thought to be responsible. The narrator may feel responsible for the loss of his friend and as result, guilt turns to fear, but people realize their efforts in the process in which caused the guilt until it is too late in life for them to …show more content…

But the most frightening thing we can do at such times is to turn our backs on it, to close our eyes.” (419-423) and to present to those who don’t understand what a person feels when the fear. fear. For those who are able to overcome their fear, forgive themselves and realize that fate is to blame because they are not always superior and in control, are able to live happily and sadly watch those who are not able to forgive them self, die. In conclusion, Harukis Murakami allows his readers to question if fate is to blame for the forces of nature and human actions that take lives from people that in the end, blame themselves for something that fate has determined, through his book, The Seventh Man. Murakami also allows his readers to think and question, can a person recover from tragedy? The Seventh can not only allows us to think if fate sometimes is able to take the blame for the loss of something, but gives us insight to the minds of those who feel loss, guilt, and live their entire lives fearing that they may lose someone or something that is close to them when in fact they are not able

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