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Compare And Contrast Lamb To The Slaughter And Harrison Burgeron

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The two short stories, Lamb to the Slaughter by Roald Dhal and Harrison Burgeron by Kurt Vonnegut are written with varying purposes. Lamb to the Slaughter was written to portray the theme of betrayal, and the power that the pain holds in the mind of the victim. Harrison Burgeron was written to depict the futuristic society in which the story is set. Both authors use different contexts and forms of writing to ultimately portray the main themes of their story. Although written during the same era, both the story of Lamb to the Slaughter and Harrison Burgeron are written with different historical contexts. Lamb to the Slaughter was both written in the 1950s and was also set in the 1950s. Mary Malony describes the ideal behaviour of a couple …show more content…

In Lamb to the Slaughter, Dhal instantly allows the reader to clearly understand his vision of displaying the theme of betrayal. He, also uses a first person narrative that outlines the daily routine of an everyday housewife in the 1950s to display the power of irrational behaviour due to betrayal. This can be seen when Mrs. Malony kills her husband, soon after he tells her that he is leaving her. “At that point, Mary Maloney simply walked up behind him and without any pause, she swung the big frozen leg of lamb high in the air and brought it down as hard as she could on the back of his head. She might as well have hit him with a steel bar.” By allowing the pain to affect Mrs. Malony’s decisions, the author is able to portray his interpretation of the consequences of abandonment. On the other hand, Vonnegut uses mockery to display how totalitarianism has no place in the future. Furthermore, Vonnegut exhibits scenarios in which totalitarianism takes power, yet is constantly plotted against by radicals. This is displayed when Harrison Burgeron removed his handicaps, “Harrison tore the straps of his handicap harness like wet tissue paper, tore straps guaranteed to support five thousand pounds. Harrison's scrap-iron handicaps crashed to the floor.” This quotation proves that the author wanted to display that even in times of totalitarianism, it never has the complete

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