The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell

Table of Contents

Learning Goals

About the Story

The Author

The Story

Characters

The Setting

The Plot

Genre, Themes, Symbolism and Motifs

Activities

Credits

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Learning Goals

Identify and enjoy features of classic literature.

Analyze interactions among discourse elements that constitute a genre.

Acquire vocabulary and grammar structures in context.

Develop higher order thinking skills to spot clues, make inferences, think critically and draw conclusions to pose arguments in answer to writing and speaking prompts.

Engage in individual and collaborative group work in integrated language skills.

About the story

"The Most Dangerous Game," a 1924 short story by Richard Connell, follows the events of two hunters competing in a unique and life-threatening game of hunt. The short story explores some of life's toughest moral dilemmas and has been adapted and borrowed from countless times since its first publishing in January 1924.
The story considers the true difference between humans and animals and asks the reader to consider whether animals know they are being hunted and feel fear. It also explores the idea of power and who holds it.

Most Dangerous Game story_questions.pdf

Image credits
Scan of magazine, Public Domain.

The Author

Richard Connell was born in on October 17th, 1893 in Poughkeepsie, New York. His father was a newspaper reporter who later became a congressman. Following in his father's footsteps, Connell began working as a reporter as a young man at the Poughkeepsie News-Press where his father had worked at one time.
Connell began attending Georgetown University but took a year off in 1910 to work for his father as a secretary after the older man won his seat in Congress. Two years later in 1912, Connell's father died suddenly. Richard returned to college but began a course at Harvard University instead of Georgetown. At Harvard, Connell was the editor of The Harvard Crimson and The Harvard Lampoon.
In 1915, Connell graduated from Harvard and began working as a journalist, full-time. Shortly afterward, however, the United States entered World War I and Connell enlisted in the army and served with the 27th New York division. He spent a year in France and ended up editing the camp newspaper Gas Attack. After the war ended, Connell returned to the US and married Louise Fox in 1919. Later that year, he sold his first short story.

Throughout the 1920's and 30's, Connell created and sold the bulk of his work, most of which were screenplays. Starting with his novel, "The Mad Lover" in 1927, Connell saw modest success but not much critical acclaim throughout his writing career. Though he wrote over ten screenplays, Connell is perhaps most famous for his short story, "The Most Dangerous Game" (1924) an action-packed thriller that is still regularly adapted today.
In the mid-1920's, the Connells moved to California and Richard began working regularly as a screenwriter. Several of his short stories were made into silent films in the 1920's and at the end of the decade in 1929, his first story was made into a movie with sound.
Connell regularly worked with other screenwriters to help adapt their vision as well. In 1941, the movie "Meet John Doe" was nominated for an Oscar for best story and had been developed by Connell. In 1945, his screenplay for "Two Girls and a Sailor", a musical comedy, was also nominated.
Connell was still working as a writer when he suffered a heart attack on November 22nd, 1949 and died quickly. After his death, his stories continued to gain life and "The Most Dangerous Game" in particular continues to be adapted to this day.

The Story

"OFF THERE to the right--somewhere--is a large island," said Whitney." It's rather a mystery--"
"What island is it?" Rainsford asked.
"The old charts call it 'Ship-Trap Island,"' Whitney replied." A suggestive name, isn't it? Sailors have a curious dread of the place. I don't know why. Some superstition--"
"Can't see it," remarked Rainsford, trying to peer through the dank tropical night that was palpable as it pressed its thick warm blackness in upon the yacht.
"You've good eyes," said Whitney, with a laugh," and I've seen you pick off a moose moving in the brown fall bush at four hundred yards, but even you can't see four miles or so through a moonless Caribbean night."
"Nor four yards," admitted Rainsford. "Ugh! It's like moist black velvet."
"It will be light enough in Rio," promised Whitney. "We should make it in a few days. I hope the jaguar guns have come from Purdey's. We should have some good hunting up the Amazon. Great sport, hunting."
"The best sport in the world," agreed Rainsford.
"For the hunter," amended Whitney. "Not for the jaguar."
"Don't talk rot, Whitney," said Rainsford. "You're a big-game hunter, not a philosopher. Who cares how a jaguar feels?"
"Perhaps the jaguar does," observed Whitney.

"Bah! They've no understanding."
"Even so, I rather think they understand one thing--fear. The fear of pain and the fear of death."
"Nonsense," laughed Rainsford. "This hot weather is making you soft, Whitney. Be a realist. The world is made up of two classes--the hunters and the huntees. Luckily, you and I are hunters. Do you think we've passed that island yet?"
"I can't tell in the dark. I hope so."
"Why? " asked Rainsford.
"The place has a reputation--a bad one."
"Cannibals?" suggested Rainsford.
"Hardly. Even cannibals wouldn't live in such a God-forsaken place. But it's gotten into sailor lore, somehow. Didn't you notice that the crew's nerves seemed a bit jumpy today?"
"They were a bit strange, now you mention it. Even Captain Nielsen--"
"Yes, even that tough-minded old Swede, who'd go up to the devil himself and ask him for a light. Those fishy blue eyes held a look I never saw there before. All I could get out of him was 'This place has an evil name among seafaring men, sir.' Then he said to me, very gravely, 'Don't you feel anything?'--as if the air about us was actually poisonous. Now, you mustn't laugh when I tell you this--I did feel something like a sudden chill.
"There was no breeze. The sea was as flat as a plate-glass window. We were drawing near the island then. What I felt was a--a mental chill; a sort of sudden dread."

"Pure imagination," said Rainsford.
"One superstitious sailor can taint the whole ship's company with his fear."
"Maybe. But sometimes I think sailors have an extra sense that tells them when they are in danger. Sometimes I think evil is a tangible thing--with wave lengths, just as sound and light have. An evil place can, so to speak, broadcast vibrations of evil. Anyhow, I'm glad we're getting out of this zone. Well, I think I'll turn in now, Rainsford."
"I'm not sleepy," said Rainsford. "I'm going to smoke another pipe up on the afterdeck."
"Good night, then, Rainsford. See you at breakfast."
"Right. Good night, Whitney."
There was no sound in the night as Rainsford sat there but the muffled throb of the engine that drove the yacht swiftly through the darkness, and the swish and ripple of the wash of the propeller.
Rainsford, reclining in a steamer chair, indolently puffed on his favorite brier. The sensuous drowsiness of the night was on him." It's so dark," he thought, "that I could sleep without closing my eyes; the night would be my eyelids--"
An abrupt sound startled him. Off to the right he heard it, and his ears, expert in such matters, could not be mistaken. Again he heard the sound, and again. Somewhere, off in the blackness, someone had fired a gun three times.