Lamb To The Slaughter Essay

Although Mary had many traits, her dominant trait was her weak will to stand up to Abigail. She was easily influenced by Abigail and highly intimidated by her too. In Act 1 Mary knew that Betty wasn’t really sick. She didn’t speak against Abigail, because she threatened to kill anyone who stood against her, and Mary of course stayed silent. Towards the end of Act 2 Mary showed a little bit of forcefulness towards John by telling him that he couldn’t stop her from going to Salem every day. Her forcefulness was quickly shut down in the end of Act 2, when she was brought to tears, when asked to testify against

Mary is a very confused girl who is easily manipulated, as is seen by Abigail. Mary is

The first reason why I believe Mary is criminally responsible for her role in the murder of her husband is because of the way she manipulated the crime scene. Mary brutally murdered her husband with a frozen leg of lamb, an unusual choice in the first place. After committing the murder, and realizing what she had done, Mary leaves his body limp and lifeless on the floor, and goes upstairs to clean up, and make herself presentable. “All right, she told herself, So I’ve killed him.” (Dahl 382). This sudden realization shows that Mary knows what she’s done and comprehends the gravity of the situation. “Then she washed her hands and ran upstairs to the bedroom. She sat down

In “A Lamb to Slaughter”, Mary Malonee killed her husband Patrick Malonee. Her motive behind the crime was because Patrick was leaving her all of the sudden. Patrick Malonee did not treat Mary well at all. He didn’t tell her why he was leaving but in the story there were different possibilities to be inferred such as, Mary being pregnant or Patrick was having an affair. Mary thought of everything to cover up the murder. She was worried about what they would do to her baby if she would have been caught. The story takes place in small town in the 1950’s and back then people weren’t so knowledgeable when it came to things like figuring out those crimes. Mary was underestimated because the police never once thought that it could have been her that

Marry would faint in court when they would ask her about what happened in the forest,so she's asked to faint in front if the court to prove to everyone in the court it was all an act. She was just protecting her reputation with Abigail, because Abigail not only threatened her but the whole group of girls , not to say anything about what happened in the forest. Once Mary was threatened, her mindset was to fit in abigail's group. She changed from being a good girl at home to, accusing random people for Abigail.

Not thinking, she went and picked up the first thing that came in her hand out of the freezer. This was a leg of lamb. She then goes back upstairs and goes straight into the living room and notices Patrick with his body turned to face the other direction and not towards her. (2). With his actions, we can tell he is unsatisfied and hurt for telling his wife what he told her. Mary ends up going behind his back and hitting him with the leg of lamb she got out of the freezer. She ends up killing Patrick. She went from a sweet loving wife to a cold, blooded murderer. Once she gets out of the no thinking zone, she realizes that the truth was told. She just killed her husband. Mary starts to become supostitious of how she would be going to jail if anyone found out. She even thought about the baby and she doesn’t want anything bad to happen to her baby. She then thinks of a way to convince people she did not kill her husband. This was going down to the grocery so it seems as if she was just a victim and it happened while she was

tive words to show your first impressions of Mary Maloney. Mary Maloney is portrayed as the ideal housewife because she greets her husband at the door to take his coat to hang it in the closet. Additionally, she fixes drinks for themselves, makes dinner, and seems to love her husband dearly. Mary seems very calm and content.

To begin with, Mary Mathilda’s motive for the killing is clearly stated in the following excerpt: "Mr. Bellfeels took her [Mary-Matilda] as his right, in his natural arrogance of ownership . . . “If it wasn’t you, Mary-girl” Ma told her, “it would be somebody else’s

To begin with, Mary may be malice, but do to her quick thinking she is a loving housewife who cares for her husband. When her husband (Patrick) arrives home from work, Patrick gives Mary information that he is leaving. This shocks Mary, but still manages to round up dinner for them. She grabs the first object she could find which was lamb. On her way back to the kitchen with the big frozen leg of lamb, Patrick, who had his back turned toward Mary said he was going out and that he didn’t want her to make anything. At this point, Mary walked up behind him and without any pause, swung the big frozen leg of lamb in the air and brought it down hard on the back of his head. After Patrick had fallen onto the floor, Mary had many questions, but everything became clear to her. “She carried the meat into the kitchen, placed it in a pan, turned the oven on high, shoved it inside” (Dahl). Mary then hurries to the store to buy vegetables for dinner. On her way back she convinced herself to act normal because nothing was wrong. “And if, She happened to find anything unusual, or tragic, or terrible, then naturally it would be a shock and she’d become frantic with grief and horror. That’s the way, she told herself. Do everything right and natural. Keep things absolutely natural and there’ll be no need for any acting at all” (Dahl). Mary put a ton of thought into her plan after realizing all the possibilities that would happen to her if she was caught.

* Why did Mary defy Mr Neal? What did she achieve? What role does the character of Mary play in the text?

After killing her husband Mary develops an act that makes the detectives believe that she had no part in her husband’s sudden death. To bury the evidence of her crime, Mary decides to feed the detectives dinner, which just so happens to be the leg of lamb that she used to kill her husband. Her ability to plan the ‘perfect murder’ and her mischievous ‘giggle’ at the end of the story, suggested that there is a darker side to human nature and that even the most perfect people have something to hide.

Mary definitely knows how to use manipulation to divert the police’s attention to divert the police’s attention away from finding the murderer. In addition to being manipulative, she is also ruthless. A ruthless person is someone who displays no mercy and remorse on others after committing a misdeed. Once her husband reveals to her that he has an affair, she turns into a woman full of vengeance.

Mary Warren is a good person but she changes her mind too much which can cause chaos. In the beginning of the book, Mary was hesitant to be involved with Abigail and the other girls: “They’ll be calling us witches”(Miller,17). But that soon wears off and Mary is quick to accuse the people of Salem of witch craft, along with the other girls. John Proctor catches on to the the girls’ scheme and forces Mary to confess in court. In court Mary seems as though she is willing to repent, she wants to be good again. But when the court doesnt believe her and the girls decided to turn against her, she panicked and turned on John: “You’re the devils man!” (Miller,110). So, Mary wants to be good but she also doesnt want to be hanged, this is why she changes her mind so much.

In the play, Mary is a beautiful woman and lives the life like any other girls of her time; but she is emotionally attached to her sons and her family when she marries into the Tyrone family. She is also getting old, so she keeps going on her days worrying about her change of appearance. She suffers from a morphine addiction and she is psychologically wounded because of her past. She tries many times to break free but she could not stop as she spends time with her family. She has gone through many struggles but she cannot move on with her life. She keeps looking back into the past; and she regrets marrying into the family because of the dreams she had to sacrifice such as becoming a nun or a concert pianist.

Mary is very manipulative in that she is able to create the character of the poor, pregnant wife, whose husband has just been murdered. She is able to convince the police to take pity on her, to mix her a drink and then to even eat the evidence, the leg of lamb that she has left in the oven. "Why don’t you eat up that lamb that is in the oven" (Dahl, p. 17). Mary realizes that if the police find the evidence she will go to jail. Her quick thinking and manipulative character results in the police officers eathign the evidence and therefore she cannot be charged of this crime. These actions show the complex character that Mary Maloney truly is.