Christopher J. Pereyra
English 125: Introduction to Literature
Kathy Knecht
9/24/2012
Theme and Narrative Elements in the Short Story The short story of Little Red Riding Hood is a simple to understand child’s tale and clearly portrays the deceitfulness of appearance. The story is clearly organized with characters and symbols of innocence by a child and the sly dangers represented by a wolf. Throughout the story we see the characters build more of a persona of innocence and evil. It is stated by Cassady, M. (1991), “Symbolism plays a large part in Identity and Difference.” This is seen a lot and very clearly with the oblivious thoughts of Red Riding Hood and the singular objective of the wolf constantly reminded throughout the story. The characters add to the theme and the theme is portrayed though these characters. The theme of Little Red Riding Hood is made clearer and understanding in many ways. In the original short story there are clear references to what the clear idea is behind the theme. These are pointed out and recognized by asking simple questions even supported through the text. Clungston, R. (2010), “How does the writer use setting to narrow the underlying idea? How do characters make particular aspects of the underlying idea clear? How does conflict reveal the strength or worth of the underlying idea?” These are questions more clearly defined in this story than could be found in many others. The most clear and obvious would be the characters. The antagonist being represented as a mischievous and blood thirsty wolf gave a clear view on the danger posed against the young and innocent Little Red Riding Hood. The little fun loving child was also a character who added to the theme, making it clear there was an innocent victim. Along with the presence of the characters there is a clear instance of conflict making the theme clearer. In the short story there was a most noted and