Being trapped is universally regarded as not being an enjoyable activity. Physically or mentally, captivity is not pleasant. Imprisonment will take varying tolls upon people. This essay will explore two characters from different stories that have been altered by incarceration. The circumstances behind the situations, why, and how the terms and the eventual outcomes of their confinements changed them. Completely different from each other in actions, unbeknownst to them, they share similarities in personality.
To assume too much is never a great policy, but we can make conjectures about the beginning of Harrison Bergeron’s life. George and Hazel Bergeron, the parents of Harrison from “Harrison Bergeron” by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr, were poster adults for their society. Uniform everything, from looks to intelligence, was the optimal goal of the government. The commonly accepted reasoning behind this was that if everyone was the same, there could be no quarrels over differences. Harrison Bergeron was an anomaly, something the system punishes. Forced to use constraints such as weights and headphones to stop thoughts, Harrison Bergeron hated the controlling government and longed to be free. A bit on the loopy side, his impediments excelled his hatred and took him to extremes. Harrison ended up believing that he could better rule the people of America. This lead to a failed coup and death by shotgun.
The Lawyer, a main character from “The Bet” by Anton Chekhov, accepted a frivolous bet from a youthful banker. All that is known about his character before the principal events occur is that he is young, naive, and not particularly wealthy. The stipulations of the fateful bet were thus: the Lawyer must stay in solitary confinement for exactly fifteen years, upon completion the Banker would reward the Lawyer two million rubles. This was a fortune in the late 1800s. As the bet commenced we saw the Lawyer turn his interests to studying. Anything and everything, from religion to science, was covered extensively sometime during his fifteen years of imprisonment. All of these ideas lead the Lawyer to declare humanity corrupt and in a manner of protest left the self-imposed prison only a few minutes before the bet was to be finished.
The most common feature between these two is the vigor they put into their last deeds of each story. Desertion and revolution are rather dramatic actions; both had a flare for the dramatic. These theatrical tendencies led to losses.
Harrison pranced around after busting in the door like a classical gangster. Harrison should have spent his time planning for a government attack; if he had been prepared then the chances of him not dying would have been much greater. I am surprised that he would be so foolish because the book described him as a genius, and all Einsteins need a back-up plan.
The Lawyer wrote an emotional letter then fled five minutes before two million rubles would have been his for the keeping. This act of defiance was supposed to protest the human way of money, greed, and intrinsic mortal problems. Before they Lawyer decided upon this course of action, he had already been altered by his extensive studies. These studies lead to his final known deeds.
The major difference in their final exploits was that one wanted the loss while the other did not. Harrison and the Lawyer both wanted a different society and human change.
Outstanding set-up!
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