Kyle Woodard
Mrs. Dawson
Enriched English 3-4
19 October 2016
The Compound Analysis S. A. Bodeen’s story, The Compound, is an amazing thriller that keeps the reader on the edge of their seats with tension as a constant. The story beautifully manipulates the reader into sinking into the story as if they were experiencing it themselves. The story follows Eli Yanakakis, the son of the famous billionaire Rex Yanakakis. When camping with his brother, Eddy his sisters Lexie and Terese, his grandmother who he calls Gram, disaster strikes. A nuclear attack has been fired on the United States. He is rushed to a hatch, and when he goes in, he discovers that his father has built a massive underground bunker meant to keep his family safe, called The Compound, …show more content…
Rex’s ideas that breeding (and even cloning) children as a food supply are morally wrong, and this is made clear to the audience by Eli’s reaction of utter shock (Bodeen). The Compound focuses around the revelation that Rex is not sane and that the entirety of The Compound was just an experiment. Rex, near the climax of the story, says, “[It] was merely a matter of seeing how far you would go to survive” (Bodeen 171). This plot point is foreshadowed when Eli remembers his father hosting a Christmas party and serving all of his guests turducken, even the vegetarians among them. In Eli’s flashback, he remembers hearing Rex’s closest friend and assistant, Phil, saying that to Rex, the entire thing was a game to see how far his guests would go to please him (Bodeen 101-107). It is made clear, near the end of the story, that Rex is a sociopath. When Eli is attempting to leave, Rex threatens to kill Lucas (one of the Supplements that Eli has grown especially close to). In his exact words, Rex says, “What do you think? Should I choke the life out of him or should I just snap his neck? That would be quicker.”(Bodeen 211). This shows the audience that Rex has spiraled into insanity and desensitization, and at the same time expresses the theme of the danger of desensitization to the audience by showing how it can affect a person. In the short story “Harrison Bergeron,” this is
Mrs. Dawson
Enriched English 3-4
19 October 2016
The Compound Analysis S. A. Bodeen’s story, The Compound, is an amazing thriller that keeps the reader on the edge of their seats with tension as a constant. The story beautifully manipulates the reader into sinking into the story as if they were experiencing it themselves. The story follows Eli Yanakakis, the son of the famous billionaire Rex Yanakakis. When camping with his brother, Eddy his sisters Lexie and Terese, his grandmother who he calls Gram, disaster strikes. A nuclear attack has been fired on the United States. He is rushed to a hatch, and when he goes in, he discovers that his father has built a massive underground bunker meant to keep his family safe, called The Compound, …show more content…
Rex’s ideas that breeding (and even cloning) children as a food supply are morally wrong, and this is made clear to the audience by Eli’s reaction of utter shock (Bodeen). The Compound focuses around the revelation that Rex is not sane and that the entirety of The Compound was just an experiment. Rex, near the climax of the story, says, “[It] was merely a matter of seeing how far you would go to survive” (Bodeen 171). This plot point is foreshadowed when Eli remembers his father hosting a Christmas party and serving all of his guests turducken, even the vegetarians among them. In Eli’s flashback, he remembers hearing Rex’s closest friend and assistant, Phil, saying that to Rex, the entire thing was a game to see how far his guests would go to please him (Bodeen 101-107). It is made clear, near the end of the story, that Rex is a sociopath. When Eli is attempting to leave, Rex threatens to kill Lucas (one of the Supplements that Eli has grown especially close to). In his exact words, Rex says, “What do you think? Should I choke the life out of him or should I just snap his neck? That would be quicker.”(Bodeen 211). This shows the audience that Rex has spiraled into insanity and desensitization, and at the same time expresses the theme of the danger of desensitization to the audience by showing how it can affect a person. In the short story “Harrison Bergeron,” this is