Richard Connell's Use Of Suspense In The Most Dangerous Game

Suspense is defined as the author withholding information or when the unexpected happens, leaving you guessing and wanting more. In the story “The Most Dangerous Game” by Richard Connell, he has inserted much suspense in this short (long) story, for the reason that it makes the reader want to know more and having to mindset of excitement or surprise. Another reason he added many suspense is so that it wouldn’t be so blunt, it wouldn’t just tell us what happened it would give us details and how he got or how he did that and more.

Mood is an important element in all stories, because it decides how the reader feels for the rest of the story. There are different ways for an author to create mood, some of which impact first impressions like characterization and foreshadowing, but some take place in the moment like conflict. In the story, “The Most Dangerous Game”, Richard Connell uses the literary techniques foreshadowing, characterization, and conflict to create suspense.

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 short story, “The Most Dangerous Game,” author Richard Connell expertly exploits foreshadowing and vivid imagery to emphasize danger and suspense. Many authors attempt to do this, but only a small few succeed. Everyone who has stayed up past their bedtime reading a book will tell you, they stayed awake because the book they were reading was filled with suspense. It is suspense that separates the great stories from the good stories. And “The Most Dangerous Game” is definately a great one. By using foreshadowing and utilizing his characters five senses, Connell keeps readers at the edge of their seats, eagerly waiting to find out what comes next.

In Richard Connell's short story, "The Most Dangerous Game';, the use of literary devices, found blended with other literary devices, gives the story an inner meaning. The blending of literary devices effectively expresses the intentions of Connell to present contrast between the antagonist and protagonist points of view. As a result, the reader can gain insight on the good and evil sides of the story to enhance the purpose of his interpretation. "The Most Dangerous Game'; by Richard Connell presents literary devices such as foreshadowing, setting, and irony which reveal the underlying meaning of the story.

To help illustrate that the direction of perspective from hunter to hunted has changed, Connell uses situational irony. At the beginning of the story, the reader is introduced to the main character of the story, Sanger Rainsford, a world renowned hunter. Rainsford mentions at the beginning of the story: “‘Who cares how a jaguar feels?’ ‘Perhaps the jaguar does,’ observed Whitney. ‘Bah! They’ve no understanding” (Connell 18). This reveals that he believes jaguar do not have emotion when they are prey. Only until he learns that General Zaroff, a hunter living on a big island that Rainsford had washed up on, was hunting humans and his intention is to hunt Rainsford as well. This is ironic because Rainsford is a hunter who is being hunted, allowing him to step into the “shoes” of the jaguar. He is now able to see the other side of the

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.

The short story, The Most Dangerous Game, by Richard Connell, incorporates imagery to intensify the suspense within the literary piece. By using this literary element, Connell depicts a mood that escalates from casualness to increasing panic.

Hunting big game animals for sport was a popular pastime with the wealthy classes following World War I. The morality of killing for sport was not questioned in reality, but in this short story the author does question it by taking it a step further and having the protagonist, Sangor Rainsford, hunted by the antagonist, General Zaroff.In a short story full of irony, one of the greatest ironies of Richard Connell’s “The Most Dangerous Game” is that General Zaroff repeatedly tells Rainsford that he maintains a sense of civilization on his island.

During the time in which Rainsford and General Zaroff are eating dinner in Zaroff’s fine house the two men were discussing an animal that would be exciting the hunt. That had reason. Rainsford states, “But no animal can reason,” (page __). He his confused until the realization dawns on him. Those few words are significant to the entire plot of the story.

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.

All stories have at least one of three different kinds of conflict, man versus man, man versus nature, and man versus himself. Some stories, like Richard Connell's “"The Most Dangerous Game"”, use all three conflicts uniquely and clearly. When each conflict is put to a test of strength in the story, man vs man is the strongest. The weakest is man vs himself. And the final conflict is man vs nature. The three conflicts are used evenly so they end up being as significant as each other.

    Though there are many different moods in the story, “The Most Dangerous Game,” the most common mood was suspense. An example of this is when General Zaroff said, “ what are the attributes of an ideal quarry?...It must have courage, cunning, and above all it must be able to reason.” “But no animal can reason,” objected Rainsford. “My dear fellow,” said the general, “there is one that can.” this is suspenseful because there is only one animal who has courage is cunning and can reason. That animal is a

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.

In the story The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell, the author used suspense to make the reader feel a sense of uneasiness as they cannot predict what will happen next. Compared to the other stories that attempted to use suspense to, such as Cask of Amontillado and The Perfect Storm, The Most Dangerous Game is superior to the others. To successfully convey the feeling of suspense, the author used intensity, the appeal of the characters, and the cliffhanger ending.