The
text
under analysis is the great humor story "The Ransom of Red
Chief" written by a prolific
American authors O. Henry. O. Henry is one of the most famous short story
writers in America (and also one of the most humorous in literature) and “The
Ransom of Red Chief” is one of the wittiest and most hilarious short stories
that he ever wrote. O. Henry is the pen name, formerly named William Sidney
Porter (William Sydney Porter). He is the famous American critical realism
writer, the master of the short stories.
American Realism was a late nineteenth-century literary movement that began as
a reaction against romanticism and the sentimental tradition. American Realism
was most commonly a feature of narrative fiction and it influenced on O.
Henry’s style of writing. O. Henry created his stories on the background of
rapid development of capitalism and business when the invasion
commercialization of American society
suppressed and destroyed in people kindness and spirituality.
O. Henry’s
characters - a common "small, ordinary" people of American
society: clerks, teachers, artists, photographers, stenographer. The writer
portrays all of them as carriers of the
idea of humanism. These people are friendly
, can sacrifice, love their neighbors,
have the desire make the goodness, although they are suppressed by the bourgeois reality. As for other O. Henry’s works,
we should mention "The Gift of the Magi", "The Cop and the
Anthem”, "The Duplicity of Hargraves” and “The Last Leaf”.
Speaking of the title, it's rather suggestive. If I hadn't read "The Ransom of Red Chief", I would
have associated the title with the real person, the chief of the Indian tribe.The
story "The Ransom of Red Chief" is about two men who kidnapped and attempted to ransom
a wealthy Alabaman's son. The more they spent time with that naughty boy the
more they assured themselves in failing
the ransom. The point is that at the end
the criminals had to pay the boy's father to take him back. It makes
the comic effect for the whole events.
The basic themes in the story are:
· bad child’s upbringing and the patent’s
negligence (a child may not turn out to be the loveable person parents can be
proud of but rather the very opposite);
· the theme of getting easy money and its
consequences;
· personal qualities of character and attitude to
the different problems.
The events in the analysed
text happen in a cave near Summit in Alabama. As the
narrator of the story says : " There
was a town down there, as flat as a flannel-cake, and called Summit".
The other gives us the example of vivid irony with the help of simile. The setting of the events in the
"The Ransom of Red Chief" is rather realistic and presented in general
way. It provides a background for action and symbolizes the emotional state of
characters (they are a little tired of their criminal speculation and need easy
money) , reflects Bill and the
narrator’s personality and the cave resembles their way of life: “We knew that Summit couldn't get after us with
anything stronger than constables and, maybe, some lackadaisical bloodhounds
and a diatribe or two in the Weekly Farmers' Budget. So, it looked good”.
“About two miles from Summit was a little mountain,
covered with a dense cedar brake. On the rear elevation of this mountain was a
cave. There we stored provisions”.
They are moving from a one place to another in order to earn money for
their living: “ We were down
South, in Alabama… we needed
just two thousand dollars more to pull off a fraudulent town-lot scheme in
Western Illinois with”.
From the point of view of presentation
the text is the 1st person narrative. I think that the author uses it for the purpose. The 3rd person narrative identifies by the inability of the
narrator to know what is going on in the thoughts of all of the characters, at
the same time limits for the reader
understanding of the events and the
characters. O. Henry introduces us the 1st person narrative in order to be in touch with the reader,
implies the feeling real-to-life events and shows his attitude to the problems
and other characters.
The characters we meet in the text
under analysis are (main) Red Chief
(kidnapped boy Johnny, Ebenezer
Dorset's son), the narrator Sam and Bill Driscoll (criminals) and the secondary character is Ebenezer Dorset. The boy,
Ebenezer Dorset's son is supposed to be a the protagonist , main figure of a
story and Bill Driscoll and the narrator
are supposed to be antagonists in the story. As it's known, protagonist is
usually the "good" guy in the story. The principal opponent of the
protagonist is a character known as the antagonist who represents or creates
obstacles that the protagonist must overcome. But O. Henry is a master of irony
and the ironic twist ending. The
Dorset's son turns out to be a giant pain-in-the-neck and the kidnappers
can't wait to take him back home. The kidnappers are basically good people
(protagonists) who never intended to the
harm the boy and actually event take good care of him and play games. The
writer reveals Red Chief directly and indirectly by means of
- surfacing
physical appearance, for example:
“The kid was a boy of ten, with
bas-relief freckles, and hair the colour of the cover of the
magazine you buy at the news-stand when you want to catch a train”.
- boy’s
actions, for example:
“The kid was in the street, throwing
rocks at a kitten on the opposite fence”;
“The boy catches Bill neatly in the
eye with a piece of brick”;
“That boy put up a fight like a
welter-weight cinnamon bear”;
- boy’s
speech, for example:
“Ha! cursed paleface, do you dare to
enter the camp of Red Chief, the terror of the plains?"; Lexical peculiarities are represented by the
vocabulary the characters use colloquial and slang words: “You
are the hoss," says Black Scout. "Get down on your hands and
knees. How can I ride to the stockade without a hoss?"
; "I was only funning," says he
sullenly. "I didn't mean to hurt Old Hank. But what did he hit me for?”. It indicates the speech of young, uneducated and naughty
boy. The character’s pronunciation is also typical of uneducated speech. There
we can find a case of graphon: “You
dassent catch toads unless with a string”. In characer’s speech there are also elliptical
sentences and detached constructions: “Ha!
cursed paleface, do you dare to enter the camp of Red Chief, the terror of
the plains?"; “Aw, what for?" says he.
"I don't have any fun at home. I hate to go to school. I like to
camp out; "Ninety miles," says the
Black Scout. "And you have to hump yourself to get there on time. Whoa,
now!"
The
kid has caused Sam and especially Bill
to live in alert and terror. Although both of them believe that a 10 year old
is harmless, Johnny has proved to them that he can be a deathly machine. Boy is selfish, stubborn and
ill-mannered. Not only criminals are afraid of him but also all his neighbors and the father. Maybe that's why
when he disappeared all the town continues quite joyful live in peace and his
father wasn’t looking for him. I must admit that o. Henry uses a paradox
describing the boy’s character features: “"All right!" says he. "That'll be
fine. I never had such fun in all my life." “The fun of camping out in a cave
had made him forget that he was a captive himself”. Johnny enjoys
being kidnapped.
The writer reveals Bill Driscoll by means of
- Surfacing
physical appearance, for example:
“And,
as dark as it was, and as fat as Bill was, and as good a runner as I am,
he was a good mile and a half out of summit before I could catch up with him”;
“It's an awful thing to hear a strong,
desperate, fat man scream incontinently in a cave at daybreak”;
“But I glanced at Bill, and
hesitated. He had the most appealing look in his eyes I ever saw on the
face of a dumb or a talking brute”.
- Bill’s
speech, for example:
The character is splendidly characterized through his
speech which reflects many peculiarities of the oral type of communication. “He put a red-hot boiled potato down
my back," explained Bill, "and then mashed it with his foot; and I
boxed his ears. Have you got a gun about you, Sam?";
Through the
use of metaphor and epithet the
character expresses his negative attitude to the kid. “I ain't attempting," says he,
"to decry the celebrated moral aspect of parental affection, but we're
dealing with humans, and it ain't human for anybody to give up two thousand
dollars for that forty-pound chunk of freckled wildcat”;
Lexical
peculiarities are represented by the vocabulary the characters use, for example
bookish words : “I'm
a grown person with masculine proclivities and habits of self-defence,
but there is a time when all systems of egotism and predominance fail”, colloquial
words and slang: “What's
he up to now?", “By
Geronimo! That kid can kick hard!”, “He’s got me
going!”. Features of oral speech can be well illustrated by their
syntactical peculiarities in the character’s speech, such as the use of elliptical
sentences, detached constructions, asyndetic type of connection: “Aw,
what for?" says he; "No,"
says Bill, "nothing chronic except malaria and accidents. Why?";
the ninety miles to the
stockade, not barring an inch”, I'm
sorry we lose the ransom; but it was either that or Bill Driscoll to the
madhouse”.
All these
indicators help us state that Bill wasn’t good educated and it shows his lower
status in the society because he was the criminal.
Bill is
the weakest character of the story. Though he is adult he couldn't manage with
10 year-old kind. Bill is simple-hearted
by his nature and maybe he is really good guy but some conditions made
him stick to the criminal life. Bill has soft character
and does not know how to behave with children although he allows the boy to
manipulate him. Therefore, when Bill punishes the boy, he didn't take it
seriously. We can judge that Bill is good according to his appearance and manners:
he is fat, slow and thoughtful. That makes him comical. Sam complete opposition
to Bill. He is strong, courageous and persistent. So the boy is afraid of him,
Sam has strong spirit and strong character. He is the leader who at the end
accepts the failure of their kidnapping
project. The author reveals Sam by means of
- Sam’s
actions, for example:
“I
got the knife away from the kid and made him lie down again”;
“I went out and caught that boy and
shook him until his freckles rattled”;
“At
half-past eight I was up in that tree as well hidden as a tree toad, waiting
for the messenger to arrive”.
- Sam’s
consciousness, for example:
“I
wasn't nervous or afraid; but I sat up and lit my pipe and leaned against a
rock”.
"Perhaps," says I to myself, "it
has not yet been discovered that the wolves have borne away the tender lambkin
from the fold. Heaven help the wolves!" says I, and I went down the
mountain to breakfast”.
"Tell you the truth, Bill," says I,
"this little he ewe lamb has somewhat got on my nerves too. We'll take him
home, pay the ransom and make our get-away”.
- Sam’s
speech, for example he uses slang and
colloquial words like Bill, shows also his lack of education and social status
of the bilker: “A
rowdy kid like that is just the kind that parents dote on.
His folks may
think he's spending the night with Aunt Jane or one of the neighbours. So I lighted my pipe and sat down
on a mossy bank to await developments”. Features of oral speech can be well illustrated by
their syntactical peculiarities in the character’s speech, such as the use of
elliptical sentences, detached constructions, asyndetic type of connection: “Not right away," says I”, "Me?" says I; "Oh, I got a kind of a pain in my shoulder”; "No fear of it," says I”; I’m going
away for a while, on a business”. “Great pirates of Penzance!" says I; "of
all the impudent--".
Ebenezer Dorset seems to be serious, smart, and a caring
father. He plays not so important role in the story. He is only a father who is
trying to get his son back from two kidnappers. The sarcastic thing about what
he did, is that he demands his son back with 250 $. An ordinary father wouldn’t
do that, and would pay the ransom without any hesitation. Ebenezer is a shock
for the reader.
- The writer reveals Ebenezer Dorset be means of narrative description with
implied judgment:
“We selected for our victim the only
child of a prominent citizen named Ebenezer Dorset. The father was
respectable and tight, a mortgage fancier and a stern, upright
collection-plate passer and forecloser”. From the judgement we drive the impression of the
secondary character as responsible, loving and caring man who : “…would melt down for a ransom of two
thousand dollars to a cent”.
The plot of the story runs as follows:
In the exposition we discover that Bill and Sam are in Alabama when this
kidnapping idea struck us and they are in need of two
thousand dollars. In this section , O. Henry introduces the characters and a
part of the conflict at an early part of the story. The criminals are desperate
and they are making the decision of taking easy money.
Development
of events: Bill and Sam kidnap Ebenezer’s son
and hide him in a cave. They keep his son in the cave and send the
father a letter demanding to be pay ransom in order to get his son back. The
men start to get bothered by the son. In this section, the father realizes that
his son was kidnapped. The author shows how the kidnappers treat Ebenezer’s son
, how the men lived in the cave , and a part of their personalities. The author
also shows how they plan to collect the money but the difficulties with the
kid's behavior makes men (especially Bill) nervous and tired.
Climax of
the story: the father suggests that they return his son and pay him two hundred
and fifty dollars. In return he will take his son of their hands.
Denouement:
in this section the kidnappers are forced to accept the offer and return Johnny
home and pay the ransom to the father. Bill and Sam take the kid back home,
they pay the ransom, the father allows the kidnappers to run away.
Conclusion:
The kidnappers escape, and head outside Summit to the Canadian Borders without
the money. The criminals always get what they deserve, kind of punishment.
The types
of speech employed by the author of the analysed story are narration (We were down South, in
Alabama--Bill Driscoll and myself-when this kidnapping idea struck us. It was,
as Bill afterward expressed it, "during a moment of temporary mental
apparition"; but we didn't find that out till later”).
description (“The
kid was a boy of ten, with bas-relief freckles, and hair the colour of the
cover of the magazine you buy at the news-stand when you want to catch a train.
I fell into a troubled sleep, and dreamed that I had been kidnapped and chained
to a tree by a ferocious pirate with red hair”).
and dialogue (“What
you getting up so soon for, Sam?" asked Bill.
"Me?"
says I. "Oh, I got a kind of a pain in my shoulder. I thought sitting up
would rest it."
"You're a liar!" says Bill.
"You're afraid. You was to be burned at sunrise, and you was afraid he'd
do it”).
In order to
portray the characters, describe the
setting, and to render the general mood and atmosphere of the story vividly and
convincingly the author of the analysed text resorts to the following lexical devices:
“I
never lost my nerve yet till we kidnapped that two-legged skyrocket of
a kid”.
“Do you think anybody will pay out
money to get a little imp like that back home?”;
"… and it ain't human for anybody to
give up two thousand dollars for that forty-pound chunk of freckled wildcat”; "Tell you the truth,
Bill," says I, "this little he ewe lamb has somewhat got on my
nerves too”.
The negative features and attitude to Johnny are enhanced through the use of metaphors that
emphasize the behavior of the character and the ironic treatment to the boy as
the main cause of troubles.
"Ha! cursed paleface, do you dare to
enter the camp of Red Chief, the terror of the plains?"
"Red Chief," says I to the kid.
The idea expressed through periphrasis is to show how the
character stresses and conveys his own individual perception of the people and
himself as well. He is powerful Indian chief of the tribe and they are white
powerless people.
“There
was a town down there, as flat as a flannel-cake, and called Summit, of
course”.
The case of simile emphasizes the striking difference between
the setting of the town and its name. We can find here a brisk type of irony.
“That
boy put up a fight like a welter-weight cinnamon bear”.
The simile is used in the story under analysis to show
how the strong and powerful was boy. Two men are hardly to handle him. That
episode produces humorous effect in the
story.
“When
I got to the cave I found Bill backed up against the side of it, breathing
hard, and the boy threatening to smash him with a rock half as big as a
cocoanut”.
The simile underlines the size and shape of cocoanut,
that reader can imagine it and think how the child can pick it up.
“I
dodged, and heard a heavy thud and a kind of a sigh from Bill, like a horse
gives out when you take his saddle off”.
The case of simile shows the bad condition of Bill and
the hardness of the kick with the rock.
“Bill
gets down on his all fours, and a look comes in his eye like a rabbit's
when you catch it in a trap”.
The case of
simile shows the hopeless situation of the person who will suffer from the humiliation.
“Behind him was the kid, stepping
softly like a scout, with a broad grin on his face”.
“When the kid found out we were
going to leave him at home he started up a howl like a calliope and
fastened himself as tight as a leech to Bill's leg. His father peeled
him away gradually, like a porous plaster”.
The idea
expressed through simile is to show how
the boy was troublesome, undisciplined and
tiresome. The criminals couldn’t get rid of him.
“Bill
and me figured that Ebenezer would melt down for a ransom of two thousand
dollars to a cent”.
“I
showed him the road to Summit and kicked him about eight feet nearer there at
one kick”.
“Enough,"
says Bill. "In ten minutes I shall cross the Central, Southern and Middle
Western States, and be legging it trippingly for the Canadian border."
The hyperbole “Ebenezer
would melt down”
shows that the
parent will be overflowed of emotions and will pay any price for the
offspring. The hyperbole ”kicked him about eight feet nearer
there at one kick”
is used to intensify the distance of the one kick. The hyperbole “In ten minutes I shall cross the
Central, Southern and Middle Western States” is used to intensify the time and distance , also shows the overflow of
Bill’s emotions and in such a way creates a humorous effect.
“The
father was respectable and tight, a mortgage fancier and a stern, upright
collection-plate passer and forecloser”.
The choice of such epithets employed by the narrator
to describe the personal features of a good and serious rich man and reveals
his ironic, sympathetic and serious attitude to the life and parenthood.
“It's
an awful thing to hear a strong, desperate, fat man scream incontinently
in a cave at daybreak”.
The choice of such epithets employed by the narrator
to describe Bill’s personal qualities reveals
his ironic and humorous attitude to the character.
“The
kid was a boy of ten, with bas-relief freckles, and hair the colour of
the cover of the magazine you buy at the news-stand when you want to catch a
train”.
The epithet “bas-relief
freckles” is
used to show the reader shape and size of those freckles that helps better to
picture the boy’s appearance.
“I
never lost my nerve yet till we kidnapped that two-legged skyrocket of a
kid”.
“…and it ain't human for anybody to
give up two thousand dollars for that forty-pound chunk of freckled wildcat”.
The choice of
such epithets employed by the narrator to describe the main troublemaker Johnny
reveals his negative, ironic reproachful attitude to the boy’s behavior and appearance.
“A
niggerhead rock the size of an egg had caught Bill just behind his left
ear”.
“Just
then we heard a kind of war-whoop, such as David might have emitted when
he knocked out the champion Goliath”.
“By and by, Bill sits up and feels
behind his ear and says: "Sam, do you know who my favourite Biblical
character is?"
"Take it easy," says I.
"You'll come to your senses presently."
"King Herod," says
he. "You won't go away and leave me here alone, will you, Sam?"
"Great pirates of Penzance!"
says I;
³
Irony:
“There
was a town down there, as flat as a flannel-cake, and called Summit, of course”.
“And,
as dark as it was, and as fat as Bill was, and as good a runner as I am, he was
a good mile and a half out of summit before I could catch up with him”.
There are above only few examples of irony because we
can find it through the al story.
The author of the analysed text resorts to the
following syntactical devices:
“They weren't yells, or howls, or
shouts, or whoops, or yawps, such as you'd expect from a manly set of vocal
organs--they were simply indecent, terrifying, humiliating screams, such as
women emit when they see ghosts or caterpillars”.
Climax is used to employ emotional and logical influence
of the situation on the reader.
“It
was, as Bill afterward expressed it, "during a moment of temporary mental
apparition"; but we didn't find that out till later”.
“That boy put up a fight like a
welter-weight cinnamon bear; but, at last, we got him down in the bottom
of the buggy and drove away”.
“Then
we had supper; and he filled his mouth full of bacon and bread and
gravy, and began to talk”.
“Nobody
was dragging the creek; no couriers dashed hither and yon, bringing
tidings of no news to the distracted parents”.
“I'm
sorry we lose the ransom; but it was either that or Bill Driscoll to the
madhouse".
The case of asyndeton creates a certain rhythmical
arrangement, usually making the narrative measured, dynamic and tense.
“Then
we had supper; and he filled his mouth full of bacon and bread and
gravy, and began to talk”.
“I
made him and Bill shake hands, and then I took Bill aside and
told him I was going to Poplar Cove, a little village three miles from the
cave, and find out what I could about how the kidnapping had been
regarded in Summit”.
“Bill
and I got paper and pencil and worked on the letter while
Red Chief, with a blanket wrapped around him, strutted up and down, guarding
the mouth of the cave”.
“Bill
turns and sees the boy, and loses his complexion and sits
down plump on the ground and begins to pluck aimlessly at grass and
little sticks”.
“They weren't yells, or
howls, or shouts, or whoops, or yawps, such as you'd
expect from a manly set of vocal organs--they were simply indecent, terrifying,
humiliating screams, such as women emit when they see ghosts or caterpillars”.
In opposition to the asyndeton, polysyndeton makes the
utterance more rhythmical.
“Red
Chief," says I to the kid, "would you like to go home?"
"Aw, what for?"
says he. "I don't have any fun at home. I hate to go to school. I like to
camp out. You won't take me back home again, Snake-eye, will you?"
"Not right away,"
says I. "We'll stay here in the cave a while."
"All right!" says he. "That'll be fine. I never had such fun in all
my life."
Elliptical sentences here are used to reproduce
colloquial speech, quick tempo and emotional tension.
“I'm
going away for a while, on business”.
“Ha!
cursed paleface, do you dare to enter the camp of Red Chief, the terror of
the plains?"
“Sam," says he, "what's
two hundred and fifty dollars, after all?”.
Using the detachment the author emphasizes secondary
parts of the sentence, shows their importance.
The author of the analysed text resorts to the
following phonetic devices:
“He
kept us awake for three hours, jumping up and reaching for his rifle and
screeching: "Hist! pard," in mine and Bill's ears, as the
fancied crackle of a twig or the rustle of a leaf revealed to his young
imagination the stealthy approach of the outlaw band”.
“They weren't yells, or howls,
or shouts, or whoops, or yawps, such as you'd expect from a manly set of vocal
organs”.
“during
a moment of temporary mental apparition";
“that
kid can kick hard”;
“we got him down in the bottom
of the buggy and drove away”;
“
I whipped
Ed Walker twice”.
“his mouth full of bacon and bread
and gravy, and began to talk”.
Alliteration in this case is used to intensify thr
rhythmic effect of the events and actions.
“Bill
neatly in the eye with a piece of brick”.
“pick up his stick
rifle and tiptoe”.
Assonance in this case shows the quickness of the boy’s
actions that makes him comical.
The author of the analysed text resorts to the
following graphic and phonetic device:
“You
dassent catch toads unless with a string”.
The case of graphon emphasizes boy’s age, education and
social background. Though boy is reach
but he behavies in a rude way and doesn’t want to study. The author
achieves the ironical effect because hia parents are not
interested in Johnny’s education.
The author of the analysed text resorts to the
following graphic device:
“TWO
DESPERATE MEN”.
In this case the writer uses capitalization to add
more logical and emotive signification of the phrase. The writer emphasizes
that men really need money so they have no choice as to kidnap Johnny and get
easy money.
All these vivid stylistic devices are used in the
story for bringing bright and neat descriptions
of the events, the personages and their emotions. These devices give the reader the understanding of the
story and the characters more broader and show the humorous and ironical mood
in a way.
Summing up the analysis of the given story I’d like to
say that O. Henry is fond of using unusual and unexpected word combinations,
similes and allusions, all of which produce a humorous effect, a kind of the
humor of surprise. The writers choice of words is topnotch and totally provides the readers insights into the lives, emotions and
feelings of his characters. His use of slang and colloquial words in everyday
situations intensifies the humor and
surprises in this particular story. Besides O. Henry widely uses irony and paradox that proves his mastery. “The Ransom of Red Chief" is widely popular
story in around the world and has always
been one of the favorites. This story has everything what you need: a well
written plot, great humor, the most memorable characters, and a surprise
ending.
