Allusions In The Most Dangerous Game

Although not all people agree that humans killing animals is ok to do for fun, can most conclude that humans killing humans is wrong? All but one man in this short story believes this to be true. The author of The Most Dangerous Game, Richard Connell, incorporates literary devices to tie the readers closer to the events happening by messing with your emotions. He does this when you know something the main characters don’t, and that can make you nervous or worried. In this story, foreshadowing and allusions are used to create an uncomfortable feeling for the audience. Allusions are figures of speech that remind readers of a song, popular event or person, objects, and stories. The initial example of allusion in The Dangerous Game is when General Zaroff is humming “Madame Butterfly” (Connell 32). This is a fictional short story, but by using a real-life song, it forces readers to make connections between the two worlds. In this instance, that can be very eerie because this is about a murderous man capable of terrible things, and no one wants to think about deadly people living around them. The following example of allusion is the reality that …show more content…
Richard initially writes example of this on page 18 when Whitney and Rainsford ponder if the animals that they hunt have feelings. Rainsford claims they do not, but later he finds out that the “animals” that Zaroff hunt definitely have feelings. This is very uncomfortable for individuals because this conversation is so early on and it seems to be so innocent at first. The subsequent example of foreshadowing in this book is when General Zaroff says, “I have hunted every kind of game in every land...” (Connell 23). We later confirm that this includes humans. This made others and I concerned because we knew that the general was a killer but Rainsford did not. The foreshadowing that Connell weaves into these words makes them flow and keeps the readers on their