Comparison of Themes in In The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell and “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne

What is the point of literary devices in stories, books, and poems? What do they accomplish? Could you use them properly if you knew what they were? In the short story, “The Most Dangerous Game”, author Richard Connell uses many of these devices, namely: simile, metaphor, personification, imagery, foreshadowing, irony, and allusion. Some well used devices in this story are personification and irony.

Rainsford is disgusted and sickened at the fact that General Zaroff’s idea of hunting means hunting humans. In return for his passage off the island Zaroff forces Rainsford to participate in his hunting game where he is the hunter and Rainsford is the prey. The main characters,

After the General allows small glimpses into his psyche, the fact that he is a disturbed person is temporarily forgotten about as the battle between him and Rainsford begins. In “Hunters in the Snow”, the situation with the shooting occurs early on, but the main focus of the story then transfers to the characters' and their issues for the remainder of the story. Rainsford is the typical hero: He is clever and moral, as opposed to Zaroff who is immoral. Though he claims to be "a beast at bay," Rainsford has now fully reverted to hunter mode, swimming across a small bay to Zaroff's chateau to arrive there before the general can make it back through the jungle.… out the shadowy outlines of a palatial chateau; it was set on a high bluff, and on three sides of it cliffs dived down to where the sea licked greedy lips in the shadows”. Rainsford claims that no animal can reason and when he realizes what Zaroff is doing, he calls it cold-blooded murder. Zaroff retreats to the chateau, assuming he has won the game. The General explains, "hunting was beginning to bore him," and reveals that he had to invent a new animal to hunt, one that must have "courage, cunning, and, above all, it must be able to reason. Rainsford survives, winning the game. A story, which relies on action, coincidence and surprise, is precisely the motivation that Connell needs to create a memorable commercial fiction. Rainsford is given the impression that General Zaroff is a wealthy and prominent hunter. "

Have you ever been hunted down by a psychopath war general, rabid pack of dogs, and a giant mute knouter named Ivan, and escaped? “The Most Dangerous Game,” by Richard Connell, is about a man named Rainsford who gets stranded on an island with an insane head honcho on a small, isolated island in the Caribbean sea. Behind every work of literature, are literary elements that make it successful. “The Most Dangerous Game” is successful due to descriptive imagery, suspenseful plot, and ability to get to the point.

In “The Most Dangerous Game,” Richard Connell correlates three common literary devices especially well: setting, suspense, and plot. Connell makes use of an appropriate setting, the literary element of suspense, and an interesting plot in order to strengthen the story’s recurring theme of reason versus instinct within humans, and to blur that line between reason and instinct.

A man gets hunted by another man on the deserted Ship-Trap Island in the middle of the Caribbean. Rainsford, the protagonist in “The Most Dangerous Game”, a short story written by Richard Connell, gets hunted by General Zaroff. Rainsford abounds with fear, making him crazy. General Zaroff’s arrogance causes him to feel that he possesses the right to hunt the people he captures. His arrogance causes him to commit gruesome things; in this case, murder. Prior to becoming another man’s prey, Rainsford feels that animals have no feelings, but he sympathizes for animals being hunted after he himself becomes prey. His feelings and opinions transform after this experience. “The Most Dangerous Game” consists of three central themes: fear makes an individual crazy, arrogance causes hurtful actions, and some experiences have the potential to alter an individual’s opinion.

There happen to be different settings in both of the short stories but both of the settings adapt well with their plots. In the short story, “The Most Dangerous Game” the setting takes place in the early 1920’s after the First World War on a small tropical island somewhere in the Caribbean, known as Ship-Trap Island by the sailors. Amongst the sailors, they have a mysteriously threatening reputation, which typically scares others. Individuals who pass by the area of Ship-Trap Island sense a subtle, deceptive sense of evil that haunts a number of individuals. The island is covered with a condense jungle that extends all the way down to its insidious, rocky terrain. Whereas, in the short story, “Young Goodman Brown” the story is set in the late seventeenth

In “The Most Dangerous Game”, author Richard Connell uses a variety of literary device to depict the theme. He uses the main character, Rainsford, to be the character which unfolds the theme as he goes through the experience of being treated like a wild animal and becoming the prey of another human for sport. Connell uses three literary devices frequently including foreshadowing, irony and symbolism in order to support the main theme, put yourself in the shoes of the animals you hunt.

The author Thomas Connolly explains Goodman Brown’s situation on the completely opposite side of the Christian religion. Connolly believed that Goodman Brown made the correct choice by turning his back on his neighbors because he had been in similar situations and had chosen the same path as Goodman Brown and believed that the end result made him better than a person that would have chosen to remain faithful (153). Connolly’s belief is a perfect example of incorrect theology. For example, Mark 11:25 states “And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you of your sins." Had Goodman Brown remained faithful regardless of the situation he, according to the Bible, would have been a great example of a faithful and steadfast man, which according to scripture is the final goal that God desires for all His people. The next point to bring to light is the amount of faith Goodman Brown had invested into his wife.

Rainsford, from the beginning, reveals his arrogance to the readers. “This hot weather is making you soft, Whitney. Be a realist. The world is made up of two classes - the hunters and the huntees. Luckily, you and I are the hunters.” (Connell 63). The context is that Rainsford is speaking with Whitney and he believes that the animals have a sense of understanding and fear, but Rainsford does not. Rainsford is impudent towards his friend by criticizing his beliefs. He is moreover conceited when he places himself in the higher class of society. The protagonist is being insensitive to Whitney and to the living, fearful animals, commencing the separation from morality, shown throughout this short story. The antagonist, General Zaroff, numerously illustrates his hubristic personality.

Nathaniel Hawthorne, in his short story “Young Goodman Brown,” details the frailty of human morality when he has the story’s protagonist (Goodman Brown) journey through the forest on All Hollows Eve to witness/participate in a witches’ Sabbath just to see what evil/sin is all about. During Young Goodman Brown’s journey, his faith is shaken as he witnesses those he respects the most also journeying to and participating in the witch’s Sabbath. In “Young Goodman Brown,” Nathaniel Hawthorne demonstrates that an idealistic faith in our fellow man’s righteousness could lead to disappointment, distrust, and fear.

     Nathaniel Hawthorne utilizes symbolism throughout his short story Young Goodman Brown to impact and clarify the theme of good people sometimes doing bad things. Hawthorne uses a variety of light and dark imagery, names, and people to illustrate irony and different translations. Young Goodman Brown is a story about a man who comes to terms with the reality that people are imperfect and flawed and then dies a bitter death from the enlightenment of his journey through the woods. Images of darkness, symbolic representations of names and people and the journey through the woods all attribute to Hawthorne's theme of good people sometimes doing bad things.

As cliché as it might sound, everyone has a story to tell. Most of the time, it would be the story of their life. Whether we like to admit it or not, we all are a hot mess, we are blobs of emotions ready to explode. Some of us try to put on an armor of steel and push our way through our daily lives, avoiding the inevitable. Others might pour their hearts and minds out. This particularly applies to musicians, artists and writers, since they are also humans, but better at expressing themselves.

“Young Goodman Brown” is a narrative imbued with uncertainty and unease, particularly from the perspective of the story 's titular protagonist. These emotions, though present throughout the tale, manifest themselves differently at various points in the story. As the story progresses, Goodman Brown 's perceptions of good and evil come together as one, resulting in crippling self-doubt. There is a sharp shift in their presence when Goodman Brown and his wife, Faith, return to Salem village from the woods. Prior to their return home, this feeling of uncertainty appears in Goodman Brown as indecision, regret, and guilt. Despite the forces that drive him forward – seemingly against his will, Goodman Brown has a desire to cease moving through the woods. Though that certainly creates a sense of confusion in Goodman Brown, this internal conflict unequivocally comes across as him struggling with his mixed feelings. In stark contrast to this, Brown 's feelings at the end of the story are those of doubt. There is no distinction in his mind between good and evil as there was at the start of his journey; he is no longer faced with indecision but rather fear and unknowing. He cannot trust those around him because he has mixed his perceptions of good and evil instead of keeping them distinct from each other. Ultimately, though he refuses the devil 's offer of knowledge of sin, it is his lack of knowledge that creates this doubt.

Goodman Brown’s conflicts of interest are represented throughout story through the characters. All his evil desires are his id and his reason for avoiding his sin such as the views that his society will have on him is his ego.  Levy said in his essay “The Problem of Faith in “Young Goodman Brown””, “His submission to evil suggests that the demands of the id have overtaken the ego” (379). When the highly respected people in his