The Battle within Oneself The short story, Bad News, written by Margaret Atwood in 1993, illustrates how people have no sympathy for misfortune when it does not concern themselves. The story is about a person who reads bad news regarding a fallen baby and feels good that the dilemma is not happening to them. Atwood compares this bad news to a metaphorical bird, illustrating the speed at which bad news travels, and the influence bad news has over one’s life. She demonstrates through the plot that bad news is only difficult for the people directly impacted by the event, otherwise holding no relevance in the audience’s lives. Unfortunately, one should not take pleasure in another person’s pain, and instead one should fight against the human condition
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When reading bad news, one should feel motivated and inspired to do something to stop it, however, this is not the case in Atwood’s short story. Nothing in the text is explained regarding the recovery process after the baby is dropped, therefore, one creates a hellish world of only misery and anguish, with no solution. According to Atwood, “she knows what she wants, an event by which she means a slip of the knife, a dropped wineglass or bomb, something broken. A little acid, a little gossip, a little high-tech megadeath.” (Atwood 9) The she referred to in the text is the bad news itself and the terrible world one would live in if humans didn’t have the power to make a positive difference or chose not to. Nothing would change and the world would be stuck in an endless cycle of torment, however, it doesn’t have to be this way. In the end, it all comes down to the world one wants and the world one does not want. If one feels badly enough to bring the world to a better place, they can with the motivation and inspiration to do so. Otherwise, like Bad News, there would be no end to the hardship in the newspapers and people would continue to
When reading bad news, one should feel motivated and inspired to do something to stop it, however, this is not the case in Atwood’s short story. Nothing in the text is explained regarding the recovery process after the baby is dropped, therefore, one creates a hellish world of only misery and anguish, with no solution. According to Atwood, “she knows what she wants, an event by which she means a slip of the knife, a dropped wineglass or bomb, something broken. A little acid, a little gossip, a little high-tech megadeath.” (Atwood 9) The she referred to in the text is the bad news itself and the terrible world one would live in if humans didn’t have the power to make a positive difference or chose not to. Nothing would change and the world would be stuck in an endless cycle of torment, however, it doesn’t have to be this way. In the end, it all comes down to the world one wants and the world one does not want. If one feels badly enough to bring the world to a better place, they can with the motivation and inspiration to do so. Otherwise, like Bad News, there would be no end to the hardship in the newspapers and people would continue to