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The Most Dangerous Game Literary Analysis Essay

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The Most Dangerous Game Literary Analysis Essay
The Most Dangerous Game SSA: Samuel Hammett Richard Connell was America’s most renowned short story writer of the 1920s and arguably his greatest work was the 1924 classic The Most Dangerous Game. This short story starts out with Sanger Rainsford, a world renowned hunter, traveling to the Amazon to go big game hunting with his first mate Whitley. While voyaging on Rainsford’s yacht they pass an ominous island named “Ship Trap Island” and Rainsford falls overboard where he proceeds to swim to this island. Rainsford then finds his way through the island until he reaches a great castle owned by Cassock General named General Zaroff. Rainsford is greeted by a great giant named Ivan, who is Zaroff’s servant, and is taken inside because Zaroff welcomes …show more content…
Your woodcraft against mine. Your strength and stamina against mine. Outdoor chess!” This quote is important to the work in that it shows the theme of humans valuing competition and the act of displaying power over others. Zaroff is a power hungry man wishing to display his “power” or skills of hunting over the famed Rainsford to satisfy his human need for competition. “Instinct is no match for reason” this quote is important to the work in that it presents another main theme of reason being better than instinct. Zaroff treats animals and some humans as inferior because he is more intelligence and this contrast is seen throughout the story as hunter against hunted.
Richard Connell most often uses similes and metaphors to convey the mood and tone of the work. In the beginning, for example, it is said the darkness and mist are “like a moist black velvet” referencing the velvet as a thick cloth covering them just as the darkness covers their visual senses.
The Most Dangerous Game is a wonderful short story that uses imagery and metaphors to create an eerie mood that I enjoyed. I thought it was interesting and fun to read when following a suspenseful plot that builds to a climax.
The Theme of the work is the conflict between hunter against hunted and is shown through the competitive nature of Rainsford and Zaroff’s confrontation. Zaroff holding back the truth of hunting humans and exerting his own power over Rainsford making the hunter prey in Zaroff’s

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