Dynamic Change In Richard Connell's The Most Dangerous Game

Everyone has to overcome adversity in their life. In Richard Connell’s “The Most Dangerous Game” the main character, Rainsford, fell of his boat at night time On the Island, Rainsford finds a home where General Zaroff lives. The problem is that the only way he can leave the island is if he survives a “game”. Where General Zaroff is hunting him. So Rainsford has to survive for three days.

An individual will surely change his/her perspective on how to see things and the way they approach it when they tried to put themselves on someone’s shoes. In this story “The Most Dangerous Game,” written by Richard Connell, the character Sanger Rainsford experienced to be hunted instead of his regular state of being a hunter. Throughout the story, he experienced how scary it was when his life is on the line. For example, what animals are experience when he’s hunting them. As the US Army saying “No Pain, No Gain”, the character of Sanger Rainsford needed to feel and experience the pain of terror and fear in order for him to conquer this game of man vs. man.

This example shows that Rainsford had to use his wit and mind to survive and out play his foe. Towards the end of the story Rainsford escapes by jumping off a cliff into the ocean to get away from General Zaroff. Rainsford escapes the island in a very clever way: “He reached it. It was the shore of the sea ...

–Nolan As a good illustration of a survivor, Rainsford shows an important trait of one. Rainsford has what it takes to be a survivor, that trait Rainsford has is courage. Rainsford is very brave and smart; he is able to confront his fear of things without even thinking he just does it. Clarified in the MDG packet on lines 681-682, “Rainsford hesitated. He heard the hounds then he leaped far out into the sea.”

He continuously tells himself “I will not lose my nerve.” (Conell 13) Rainsford knows in order to end his fear he must end the game. Man versus self is the final conflict in “The Most Dangerous

When Rainsford stumbled out of the ocean onto dry land, the author describes his thoughts as, “All he knew was that he was safe from his enemy, the sea…” (Connolly 3). Rainsford’s thinking at this moment is very primitive, that he is safe from his enemy. This is because Rainsford has just survived a life-threatening situation of being stranded in the ocean, and he is relieved that he is safe. This shows that despite the sophistication of human thought, when a human is in a life-or-death situation where instinct matters most, their thought becomes primitive to let their instincts take over.

Hunters believe animals are not capable of reasoning and they see them as something lesser than humans. Throughout time, these positions can change. The short story, “The Most Dangerous Game” written by Richard Connell, consists of General Zaroff being the hunter and Rainsford being the hunted. During the story, their positions change to the complete opposite.

It is now hard for him to trust anyone after being forced to be hunted. “The pit grew deeper; when it was above his shoulders, he climbed out and from some hard saplings cut stakes and sharpened them to a fine point. These stakes he planted in the bottom of the pit with the points sticking up” (Connell 34) because of this flashback Rainsford starts to get scared about himself hurting another human being. He won’t hunt again because he remembers his times of desperation and how he felt while trying to kill a living person. Another factor of Rainsford’s nervousness is when he told that the man being hunted the day before lost his head.

In the short story The Most Dangerous Game, the author Richard Connell shows that Rainsford needs control of his emotions, patience , and expert hunting and decision making skills in order to defeat Zaroff. Rainsford needs to gain control of his emotions to outthink Zaroff, who symbolizes Rainsfords "steep hill". When he finds that he is going to be hunted his natural instinct is to run and panic, but then he stops to look around and get a grip on the task at hand. Then at a critical moment when Zaroff finds him in a tree, Rainsford panics again because he realizes Zaroff is on his trail and is toying with him. Once again, he gains control of his emotions and formulates a plan.

Here in the story General Zaroff is injured by a trap that Rainsfords set. “But he was not quick enough, the dead tree crashed down and struck the general.(232) This quote shows Irony when in the start of the hunt General Zaroff thought that this was going to be an easy kill and he could continue on. Throughout the story Zaroff and Rainsford both exert arrogance.

This shows he is alert by how he realizes the hounds, Zaroff, and Ivan were all coming so he quickly set up a trap to try and kill them to escape. Also it shows that he can remember a trick he learned before and again apply it to his situation. And finally it shows that he is extremely alert by how he sets the trap up so quickly so he does not get captured by Zaroff. In conclusion all these examples show Rainsford is a survivor by how he shows alertness in dangerous situations and how he gets out of that

“After swimming for what seemed like forever, I heard an ear piercing sound off in the distance. I decided to swim in the direction of what I knew was a gun-shot, knowing that where there is men, there is food.” Rainsford explained. He later went on to tell about how he weakly pulled himself onto a rocky shore, knowing that he had now escaped from the tortuous waters, he went into a deep sleep.

He had to fight himself to stay on track. He was so scared in the jungle while the General was trying to hunt him. On page 186, it says “He could not say where he was. That was suicide.” This shows the reader that Rainsford may be thinking of what could go wrong, and is not thinking on the positive side of things.

The narrator says, “Rainsford held his breath. The general’s eye had left the ground and were traveling inch by inch up the tree. Rainsford froze there, every muscle tensed for a spring”(13). Rainsford is scared to death when the general is hunting him because this is a real life or death situation. General Zaroff is pulling tricks on Rainsford to try to get him to come down from the tree.

Rainford exposes his selfishness and lack of empathy by saying, “‘Be a realist. The world is made up of two classes-the hunters and the huntees. Luckily you and I are hunters’”(2). His actions throughout the story show his cruelty too. Rainsfords profession is killing animals, and while he does