House Of Asterion By Jorge Luis Borges: Literary Analysis

One best thinks he is a god, while a young boy thinks he is a bad angel. In The House of Asterion by Jorge Luis Borges, there is a Minotaur by the name Asterion that is in a labyrinth that he thinks he created, and he is not as mean as you would think. While in Slam, Dunk, & Hook byYusef Komunyakaa, there is a boy and his team that plays basketball, and during the story the boy, called Sonny Boy, has to deal with his mother’s death while playing basketball still. In each of the stories the characters have to deal with the same things, but each story deals with it in different ways. The House of Asterion and Slam, Dunk, & Hook share many of the same ideas like redemption, challenges, and religion but are used quite different ways. In both of the stories the characters deal with a challenge that they must overcome. Theseus from The House of Asterion must overcome the challenge of slaying the Minotaur and saving 9 people a year from dying. He has to battle his way through the labyrinth and slay the best: while in Slam, Dunk, & Hook, Sonny Boy has to deal with the challenge of his mother dying right before a game. This is a hardship that many people couldn’t do but Sonny boy did it for his team and played his heart out, while Theseus did it for fame and glory. …show more content…
In Sonny boys case he wants redemption after his mother died, and play his hardest for her. I does this by practicing so hard that the “backboard splinters”, and because of that he redeems himself during the game. But in the other story the Minotaur wanted to redeem himself. He think that every time he kills someone there soul is cleaned of all sin, and he wants to die so he can achieve this honor. This is way while fighting Theseus after he knows he will lose he lets himself die. While each are different in achieving this redemption, they all end up better