The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell vs. The Child by Tiger by Thomas Wolfe
Order Instructions:
FICTION ESSAY INSTRUCTIONS
Write a 750-word (3–4-pages) essay that compares and contrasts 2 stories from the Fiction Unit. Before you begin writing the essay, carefully read the guidelines for developing your paper topic that are given below. Review the Fiction Essay Grading Rubric to see how your submission will be graded. Gather all of your information, plan the direction of your essay, and organize your ideas by developing a 1-page thesis statement and outline for your essay. Format the thesis statement and the outline in a single Word document using current MLA, APA, or Turabian style (whichever corresponds to your degree program).
The essay is due on Monday of Module/Week 3 and must include:
- a title page,
- a thesis/outline page,
the essay itself followed by a works cited/references page of any primary or secondary texts cited in the essay.
Guidelines for Developing Your Paper Topic
Read the following short stories to compare and contrast in your essay:
• “The Child by Tiger” by Thomas Wolfe
• “The Most Dangerous Game” by Richard Connell.
Also, make at least 1 of these elements of fiction the focus of your essay:
• Conflict/Plot/Structure,
• Characterization,
• Setting,
• Theme/Authors’ Purposes,
• Point of View, and/or
• Tone/Style/Irony/Symbol/Imagery.
If you need help focusing your essay, ask yourself questions that correspond to your chosen element(s).
Conflict/Plot/Structure (This is not a summary of the stories)
• What are the basic conflicts? How do these conflicts build tension, leading to major, complicated incidents and climactic moment(s)?
• What are the ways in which each major character experiences conflict (either with self, with other characters, or with the social and/or physical environment)?
• How are the conflicts resolved? Do the protagonists succeed in achieving their goals?
• Who receives your deepest sympathy and why?
Characterization
• Who are the main characters in the stories?
• What are their outstanding qualities? Does the author give any indication as to how or why the character developed these qualities?
• What are the characters’ emotions, attitudes, and behaviors? What do these indicate to the reader about the character?
• Can the characters’ motivations be determined from the text?
Setting
• Where and when do the stories take place (remember to include such details as geographic location, time of year, time period, if the setting is rural or urban, etc.)?
• Do the settings make the stories believable or credible? How does setting impact the plot of the story, and how would the plot be affected if the story took place in another setting?
• Are the characters influenced by their setting? How might they behave if they were in a different setting?
• What atmosphere or mood does the setting create (for example, darkness may create a mood of fear or unhappiness while light or bright colors may create one of happiness)?
• Is the setting or any aspect of it a symbol, or does the setting express particular ideas?
• Does setting create expectations that are the opposite of what occurs?
Theme/Authors’ Purposes
• What is the major theme (or themes) of each story?
• Are the themes of the stories similar or different?
• How does the author convey the theme (or themes) to the reader?
• How do the stories’ themes relate to the authors’ purposes (some examples of author purposes are to entertain, to satirize, to realistically portray life’s problems, to analyze emotions and responses, and/or to communicate a moral message)?
• What unique style, techniques, or devices do the writers use to communicate their themes?
Tone/Style/Irony/Symbol
• How would you describe the tone of the piece?
• Does the tone correspond with the action occurring in the plot?
• What style does the author use (for example, one way an author might satirize is by including a lot of ironies, hyperbole, and unrealistic scenarios)?
• How might the story be different if the tone or style is changed?
• Does the writer use irony or symbols to communicate the message?
http://www.classicshorts.com/stories/danger.html
http://www.unz.org/Pub/WolfeThomas-1939n02-00132
SAMPLE ANSWER
The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell
Thesis statement
The essay compares and contrasts two short stories. These are The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell and The Child by Tiger by Thomas Wolfe. The essay focuses on the following elements of fiction: conflict, theme, and imagery. Each of the two short stories has different themes, and imagery. However, they have the same conflicts.
Outline for the essay
Theme
In The Child by Tiger, the themes are: (i) both evil and violence exist within the human soul alongside goodness and gentleness, and (ii) like every other aspect of nature, human nature comprises 2 sides – one side is chaotic and repulsive whereas the other side is orderly and beautiful. In The Most Dangerous Game, the main theme is Violence and Cruelty. For instance, Zaroff shows off the heads of animals he has slayed and after he has described his latest prey, he refers to his latest collection of heads that are apparently human (Connell 157).
Conflict
In The Child by Tiger by Thomas Wolfe, the following conflicts are evident: person versus person, person versus nature, and person versus self. There are also conflicts of whites versus whites, whites versus blacks, and blacks versus blacks. In The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell, the conflicts include Human versus Human, Human versus Nature and Human versus Self.
Imagery
In The Child by Tiger, after Dick Prosser is first introduced, he appears a very religious, multi-talented and gentle person. Almost immediately however, Thomas Wolfe starts a consistent reference to Dick Prosser as a person who is very cat-like in nature, and who draws on his sly agility, speed and prowess (Wolfe 134). Thus, it could be gathered by the readers that the tiger symbolizes Dick Prosser. In The Most Dangerous Game, ungovernable, wild and teeming, the jungle powerfully symbolizes general Zaroff’s twisted psyche as well as the chaos in the island. In addition, the jungle symbolizes restriction and Rainsford’s loss of control given that it obstructs his efforts of returning to civilization.
Works cited
Connell, Richard. The Most Dangerous Game. Print. 1949.
Wolfe, Thomas. “The Child By Tiger.” Saturday Evening Post 210.11 (1937): 10-102. Academic Search Premier. Web. 1 Sept. 2015.
We can write this or a similar paper for you! Simply fill the order form!
