The Jaws Research Paper

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The Jaws novel was one of the best novels to succeed within pop culture as Peter Benchley created a masterpiece made with a mixture of mystery and drama. Benchley not only produced a great source of entertainment, but he also unknowingly created a fear within the people. A fear of sharks, that is. Benchley felt horribly responsible for the major upheaval Jaws generated, and he began to regret the effects the novel had on the great white shark. In Jaws, Benchley makes a great white shark a monstrous animal who devours the people and visitors of Amity Islands who are swimming at the beach. The outcome of the novel was that people now thought that the shark should die because it was displayed as a man-eating machine. Because of the fear of danger …show more content…

He wanted to better understand things about great whites such as their way of communication, their habitat, and how they use their instincts to figure out what is prey and what is not. Because Jaws gave him “access to all the scientists and environmentalists, and brought him closer to the ocean,” he was able to do just that (Roberts). Peter Benchley spent months, from the Southern Ocean off Australia to the southeastern tip of the African continent, expanding his knowledge on great white sharks. The more Benchley learned during his exploration, the more he “realized how little is really known about great whites” (Benchley). However, Peter Benchley managed to successfully campaign for the protection of the shark making sure that society knew that “these creatures have been responsible for only seventy-four deaths in the past one hundred years” (Roberts). He worked hard not only to prove the great white sharks’ innocence, but to make society aware of their behavior. Benchley made people aware of his newfound knowledge. In doing so, it was stated for the public to know that these specific sharks mistake human for its normal prey, and that is where some of the great white shark attacks come from. The Jaws’ author cleared the name for the animal that one of his characters describes as “an impossibly perfect piece of machinery” (Benchley 121). Peter Benchley exposed facts about the great white shark that helped people learn that the sharks really do not impose that much of a threat to society so no harm should be done against

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