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The Best Death Ever

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The Best Death Ever – Niall Griffiths
By Christian Steenfeldt, 3.U
Children cannot differentiate between what is fun and what is serious. In the short story “The Best Death Ever” by Niall Griffiths four boys are playing a game where they have to fake a death. The boy whoever fakes the best death wins the game. The four boys do not understand what they are doing and see the game, The Best Death Ever, as a fun game. Until one moment, when one of the boys misjudges the distance to ground and almost hang himself meanwhile his friends where shooting at him with their toy guns.
The story is narrated by a first person narrator who looks back at a specific incidence. The narrator technique is very post modernistic. Niall Griffiths uses a lot of …show more content…

The story is a flashback of roughly 45-60 minutes of his life. The narrator looks back at that special episode of his life and he turns all nostalgic.
The boys are strongly inspired by war movies and war stories told by the elderlies. The narrator has received a toy gun from his granddad. He knows a lot about it because of his big interest in war. As almost every other boy, they play games with guns and death involved. The problem is not that the boys play war, but that they cannot differentiate between where the fun stops. In this game Gavin almost killed himself, but it was not on purpose. A problem is, when the mom notices Gavin, she immediately saves him. Then she slaps the narrator. By slapping the narrator she punishes him for something that he does not know is wrong. The narrator is angry, because they have to award Gavin the price of the best death.
“I would shock and shake them all with the violence of my going. But we never played the game again.”
Because his mother hit him and did not tell him what they did wrong, he does not understand consequences. Therefore he still wants to win the game next time and he wants to put even more violence in than Gavin did. Luckily they never played the game again, because nobody knows what would have happened then.
This story is a perfect example to show that taking extra care of your children is highly necessary. If you do not teach your kid what is dangerous and what is not, it will have serious consequences. As in

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