The Most Dangerous Game

The main theme of "The Most Dangerous Game" concerns the ethics of killing living beings. Both Sanger Rainsford and General Zaroff are accomplished hunters who enjoy shooting big game animals....

During Whitney's conversation with Sanger Rainsford at the beginning of the story, Connell foreshadows the horrifying nature of Ship-Trap Island when Whitney mentions that the island has a bad...

When we personify something, we give it human characteristics. For example, if I said, "The flower stretched toward the sun's rays," we are giving the flower the characteristic of "stretching," a...

An additional conflict in “The Most Dangerous Game” is an internal conflict within Rainsford. On the one hand, he's a skilled hunter, a man who's bagged more game animals than anyone could possibly...

In "The Most Dangerous Game," Rainsford escapes from Zaroff by diving into the sea. Zaroff then returns to his mansion and eats dinner. As he eats, the story tells us, he feels annoyed about how...

The Most Dangerous Game has many ironies. The most obvious irony is when Rainsford the hunter becomes the hunted. In the beginning of the story, it is clear that Rainsford is not just a hunter,...

Another example of a simile can be seen when General Zaroff expresses surprise at Rainsford's values, telling him that they're out of place, "like finding a snuff-box in a limousine." Zaroff...

A metaphor is a figure of speech that makes an implied comparison between two unrelated things that happen to share certain characteristics. Throughout "The Most Dangerous Game," readers are made...

Sanger Rainsford is depicted as an inventive, disciplined man who is renowned for his hunting abilities and survives the most dangerous game. At the beginning of the story, Rainsford is depicted as...

The first trap that Rainsford sets is called a Malay mancatcher. To make the Malay mancatcher, Rainsford finds a heavy dead tree laying precariously on a smaller, living one and uses his knife to...

Figurative language is a very wide ranging categorization. It includes a great number of techniques, including but not limited to, metaphor and simile, personification, imagery, etc. If done...

The setting of the story is Ship-trap Island. Much of the story takes place in the jungle of the islands itself, but the story begins on a boat and then continues to General Zaroff’s house. At the...

As a dynamic character in Richard Connell's "The Most Dangerous Game," Sanger Rainsford does undergo changes in his attitude about hunting. In the exposition of the story, for instance, he becomes...

Like most pieces of good literature, "The Most Dangerous Game" uses a combination of direct and indirect characterization to develop Rainsford and Zaroff. In this particular story, Connell is not...

The protagonist and antagonist of the short story "The Most Dangerous Game" share at least one similarity. Rainsford and Zaroff both love the thrill of the hunt, and they have travelled to...

This is a good question. Suspense is created in several different ways. The first is through the classic technique of providing a hook that hints at part of the story. This happens literally in the...

The climax of "The Most Dangerous Game" comes when Rainsford jumps into the ocean. Zaroff has been chasing him for days. After Rainsford failure on the first day, Zaroff played "cat and mouse"...

There are two types of conflicts: internal and external. External conflicts are the events that happen outside of us, and internal conflicts are the emotional responses and or choices we have to...

A metaphor is a comparison of two things, without using the words "like" or "as" (a comparison with those words would be a simile). Typically, an author uses metaphor to make writing more poetic...

Both Rainsford and General Zaroff are experienced hunters who have an affinity for adventure and hunting dangerous prey. Both characters enjoy literature, which is evident from the general's...

The sea is often personified in the story, and described as a person would be. Personification is a type of figurative language where something nonhuman is described as if it were human or had...

General Zaroff claims that "Instinct is no match for reason" when speaking to Rainsford (Richard Connell's "The Most Dangerous Game"). Zaroff has moved on from hunting animals because they "do not...

General Zaroff is the antagonist in this story, so most character traits that are associated with him are not positive. I'd like to go a different route with this question, though. I would like to...

In literature, imagery can be described as descriptive language that helps create a picture in the reader's mind. In the hands of an expert writer, this a very effective technique as it places the...

"The Most Dangerous Game" begins with a conversation between Rainsford and Whitney on the yacht. Here, in the story's exposition, we learn of Rainsford's background as a hunter, as well as of the...

In Connell's "The Most Dangerous Game," the word bay shows up a number of times. The repetitive use of this word first applies to the way the hunting dogs sound as they search for Rainsford. Then...

Rainsford is being hunted by a madman who has everything in his favor. Zaroff, the Cossack general, is an expert hunter. He has a powerful rifle and a pack of dogs. All the odds are against...

"The Most Dangerous Game" is largely a story that emphasizes man versus man and man versus nature conflicts, though there are elements of a man versus self conflict within Rainsford. Rainsford's...

Other examples of foreshadowing in "The Most Dangerous Game": "Don't talk rot, Whitney," said Rainsford. "You're a big-game hunter, not a philosopher. Who cares how the jaguar feels?"...

At the beginning of the story, Rainsford's attitude is fairly cold toward the animals that he hunts. Rainsford loves hunting, and he feels no sympathy for the animals that he hunts and kills. While...

The two meanings of “game” in the title are “play” and “hunted animal.” The word “game” is used to refer to animals that are hunted. For example, tigers, rhinoceroses, and bears are all game....

Rainsford wins the game through his skill as a hunter. Of course, Rainsford's game with Zaroff is unlike any of his other hunts in that he is the one being pursued. Instead of trying to fight...

While both Zaroff and Rainsford believe that hunting is morally permissible based on the concept of "survival of the fittest," Rainsford thinks that hunting humans is morally and ethically wrong....

"The Most Dangerous Game," also known as "The Hounds of Zaroff," is a short story written by Richard Connell with details the tale of Sanger Rainsford, a big-game hunter who falls off a yacht while...

This is a statement from Sanger Rainsford, the main character of "The Most Dangerous Game" by Richard Connell. His shipmate has expressed sympathy for the jaguar that they may soon pursue;...

Sanger Rainsford is the protagonist in the short story, "The Most Dangerous Game." He goes from professional hunter to helpless huntee after a boating accident which leaves him stranded on the...

In Richard Connell's "The Most Dangerous Game," the author uses several allusions. The first reference is that Zaroff and Ivan are Cossacks. In 2016, The Washington Post referred to the historical...

By this, General Zaroff means that once a person has mastered a skill, it is no longer interesting. For example, if one can always win at chess, playing the game no longer provides a challenge....

The narrator describes Zaroff's physical appearance when Rainsford first sees the general descend the marble stairs of his extravagant chateau. General Zaroff is depicted as a tall, slender,...

Mood is a literary strategy that is created through diction, syntax, figurative language, and so much more. It's the way a reader feels while reading based on the way an author constructs their...

An external conflict is a conflict that a person has with forces outside himself. In “The Most Dangerous Game” Rainsford has conflicts with General Zaroff, the jungle, and Ivan. First of all,...

Because Connell does not explicitly describe Sanger Rainsford, readers must construct their own ideas about how he looks. He is obviously a wealthy man who is able to travel the world on hunting...

Rainsford attempts to sleep in a tree. He hears the cry of a bird and realizes someone is coming. It is Zaroff. Rainsford watches Zaroff examine the trail and then slowly rise, shake his head,...

The Malay mancatcher is the name of a trap that Rainsford sets for General Zaroff in the story “The Most Dangerous Game.” It is made by laying a dead tree on a living one, with a trigger which when...

The mood seems to me to be somber, eerie, uncanny, sinister, even surrealistic. If the reader identifies with Sanger Rainsford and really gets into the story, the reader will feel on the verge of...

The reason General Zaroff has been so successful is because of the features of Ship Trap Island. They fit his needs perfectly. (I don't know if my page numbers will be the same as yours, but it...

This quote is part of the last line of Richard Connell's short story "The Most Dangerous Game." The rest of the sentence reveals that it is Rainsford who is enjoying the bed. This means Rainsford...

Zaroff tells Rainsford he is bored and the humans he is hunting are inferior, which is how they end up killed. Zaroff is an expert hunter. He explains to Rainsford that he became so good at...

General Zaroff is so polite when speaking with his guest that he seems to invite Rainsford to hunt in the game with him rather than be hunted. First of all, Zaroff explains how he "stocks" his...

While Rainsford enjoyed the challenge of big-game hunting and similar recreations, Zaroff is more of an actual killer than hunter. Once Rainsford becomes both the predator and the prey, his outlook...