Dystopia In Stephen King's The Running Man
Stephen King’s novel, “The Running Man”, describes a science fiction dystopia where capitalism and game shows have swirled out of control. Stephen King wrote this novel in the early 80s under the pseudonym name, Richard Bachman. King wanted to advance his way of writing and attempt a different style that required him to take a fictitious name. King wanted his new writing style to be in a different voice, and wanted to avoid criticism. Stephen King portrays “The Running Man” as a valiant dystopia with a strong streak of the 70s social radicalism. It is 2025, Television is the opium of the people. In a world where corruption erupts, people are divided into class structures, the poor and rich. Poor people live in Co-Op City, while rich people live in Uptown. Ben Richards is a 26 years old man, who is out of luck and has no job to support his family. Meanwhile, his daughter who is 18 months old, is infected with influenza and has respiratory problems. His wife resorts to prostitution to pay the bills and buy medicine for her ill daughter. Hopeless, Ben decides to participate in one of the Network’s Games, shows where the contestant can win extra money, or die trying. He is about to become a prey …show more content…
The majority of the players are there because of the government that has made it impossible for people to obtain the necessities needed to survive virtually. Nevertheless, the players voluntarily participate and voluntarily take the exams to qualify for the games. For instance, the people in Co-Op did not have a lot of jobs which resulted in participating on the Network’s Games. Another major point is that “The Running Man” criticizes the american educational system and standardized testing. In the novel, Ben is required to take several exams like the Verbal Comprehension, Visual Logic, and Math Diagnostic. In today’s world, students are required to take the SAT and ACT, which open doors for some people and exclude
Of A History Of The SAT In 4 Questions By Cory Turner And Westervelt
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Dystopian Affairs In Fahrenheit 451
1123 Words | 5 PagesDystopian Affairs Ray Bradbury’s depiction of a dystopia is interpreted through Guy Montag and his escape from society as well as Captain Beatty and his desire to get rid of books when they explore the technology and its advances in his novel, Fahrenheit 451. Born in a time of despair from the ongoing World War II, Bradbury fell in love with books as well as horror from a young age, and he enjoyed the sense of adventure it created (“Ray”). Bradbury uses “Fahrenheit 451 [as a reflection of his] lifelong love of books and his defense of the imagination against the menace of technology and government manipulation” (“Ray”), and bases his plots, characters, and themes on his past experiences and memories. World War II is a time period when literature was suddenly disappearing and technology became greatly significant. Realizing the troubles technology will create, Bradbury wrote stories based on dystopian affairs, including his most powerful novel, Fahrenheit 451.
Technology In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men
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Argumentative Essay: Should The SAT Determine Your Future
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Argumentative Essay On ACT And SAT Scores
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The Running Man Analysis
1593 Words | 7 PagesThe Running Man The running man is the fourth novel written by the Stephen King/ Richard Bechman in 1982, highlighting the miseries of dystopia of the American world. This novel is the fourth writing material out of his seven scripts which embodies the harsh realities of the second half of the twentieth century. The main theme of this novel is the “survival of the poor”. In this novel he went through his pseudonym, Richard Beckman that he often uses in most of his sad or pessimistic stories, the man aged 28 who tries hard for the survival of himself and his family but all the efforts gone in vain (Murphy). In this story the author writes about the Ben Richard, who is an unemployed individual permanently belong to an underclass family.
Standardized Testing Research Paper
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Summary Of Americans Challenges With Health Care Costs By Alex Montero
1206 Words | 5 PagesThis issue is similar in that the main character Ben is dealing with the challenges of healthcare costs, just like the article describes how Americans’ are dealing with the same issues. Despite the similarities, the novel shares Ben’s story and how he tries to overcome the hardships of healthcare costs. Ben is dealing with the struggle of not being able to afford his infant's medical bills. To try to solve this Ben goes on the adventure throughout the book. “The Running Man” is a dystopian novel set in a future society where a game is the ultimate form of entertainment.
Standardized Testing Bias
1523 Words | 7 PagesThey argue that the real issue lies with the fact that colleges rely too heavily on the SAT in admission decisions. Scores of studies have shown that the SAT and ACT are poor indicators of students’ future success in college. Despite this, many colleges will still use these tests to weed out students who scored low, students that they predict will perform poorly in college, regardless of their levels of achievement, academic or otherwise, outside of standardized testing. This results in high numbers of students of color, who traditionally score lower on standardized tests, getting left out of the admissions process - because they’re being predicted not to do
Discrimination Present In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men
2032 Words | 9 PagesDiscrimination Present in Of Mice and Men John Steinbeck was born at the beginning of the twentieth century and experienced the turning point of many eras that are evidenced throughout his writings. Steinbeck lived through the strong economic years during World War I, the dirt poor years of the Great Depression, and even saw the beginnings of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s; all of his dreams for these decades are evidenced in his works, more specifically, Of Mice and Men. Of Mice and Men is set in the 1920’s in the Salinas Valley of California. Other writers, such as F. Scott Fitzgerald, char-acterize the 1920’s as a fun decade with a booming economy filled with men rising from rags to riches, but Steinbeck shows how life was for men
Stephen King's 'The Running Man'
1351 Words | 6 PagesStephen King’s “The Running Man” is a very tough book to summarise. There are many things that happen throughout it, but due to the nature of the situation, in the end everything around Ben Richards gets destroyed, causing many things that may seem to be key events to have very little impact on the ending of the story. The basic story, removing all of these elements, is that a man named Ben Richards is living an impoverished life in some random town in the U.S., and signs up for a death game called The Running Man to make a whole bunch of money so he can get his daughter’s pneumonia treated. The whole idea of The Running Man is that a man goes on the run for 30 days from the authorities and a group of people called the hunters who are chasing
The Pros And Cons Of The SAT
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Examples Of Dystopia In The Maze Runner
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Argumentative Essay On Standardized Testing
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