What would you do if your millionaire ex promised to save your town if she was allowed to kill you for hurting her? Would you run? Would you give in? This is the exact situation with which Alfred Ill is faced with when Claire Zachanassian comes back into town. She insists that she is seeking justice for her ex-lover, Ill’s actions on the town, but it appears as if she is merely seeking revenge, something far more personal. By disguising it as revenge she practically gets away with murder. Throughout the play, The Visit, Durrenmatt explores the question of how justice is used in order to present revenge as impersonal. Justice is an impersonal consequence that will benefit the greater good in response to an action that was detrimental to a community …show more content…
The fact that it is revenge disguised as justice is revealed by the actuality that the town would not be in this situation if it wasn't for her personal grievances. Ill did not commit a wrong doing against the town, he did only against Claire. In fact, within the town, Ill was a figure of authority and next in line for the mayor’s title. He did not mistreat any other civilians thus terrorizing the public. Claire was the one who messed with the towns economy in order to get them to feel such desperation and give into greed. This represents how it is human nature to value our own comfort over the lives of others as presented in this play. Though the towns people refuse to kill Ill at first, they begin to question him and asking him where and begin to buy expensive items, eventually giving into the temptation of Claire’s offer. This not only pulls on the concept that it is human nature is inherently greedy, but that it is easy to disguise revenge as justice by providing an impersonal reward to the
Revenge has a thin line which can easily be crossed when the revenge no longer fits the crime. Montresor speaks of this during the first paragraph when he states “I must not only punish, but punish with impunity” (Poe 141). He wants to be exempt from harm as well as from guilt. This would make the revenge sweet, or satisfying. Montresor comments on a satisfying revenge at the end of the first paragraph by saying “A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser.
A harm shall be intended to him because he provoked the revenge. The whole of the play is in stasis of tug of war of action and inaction in the soul of revenge implied by his very father, and the murderer been next to his very mother is impunity to inaction as well? And that’s what the whole play is about.., Hamlet’s procrastination after the arousal of revengeful sentiments. As Carla Dente has it that it would be impossible to have a tragedy unless Hamlet procrastinates.
Revenge is the opportunity to retaliate or gain satisfaction for a real or perceived slight ("revenge"). In “The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allan Poe, Montresor, the narrator, is out for revenge. Montressor seeks revenge against Fortunato and thinks he has developed the perfect plan for “revenge with impunity” (Baym). Montresor never tells the reader why he feels Fortunato deserves punishment. He only says that Fortunato causes him “a thousand injuries”until “[venturing] upon insult” (Baym?).
Shakespeare’s plays, among other classic works of literature, tend to be forged with the tension of human emotion. The archetypical parallel of love and hatred polarizes characters and emphasizes the stark details of the plot. More specifically, the compelling force of revenge is behind most of the motives of Shakespeare’s tragedy Hamlet. The play opens with the return of Hamlet’s father, a surprising encounter, which ended in his son learning that his father’s death was the result of foul play. By emphasizing this scene as the beginning of the story to be told, Shakespeare clearly implies that the plot itself will be based around the theme of revenge. Through three different instances of behavior fueled entirely by vengeance, Shakespeare creates an image in the reader’s mind, which foreshadows the future of the story and provides insight into the plot line. Even so, despite the theme of revenge being the overarching concern of the plot, the parallels drawn between characters truly strengthen the thematic depth of the piece overall, making the play easily one of Shakespeare’s most infamous and historically valuable works.
In which, he responds “I do, Madam. How else could I get by in Güllen? (15) and that’s exactly what he did when Ill went to visit him and when the Gymnast decided to kill Ill. Ill is strangled to death by the Gymnast with a checkered tablecloth, following the vote of the townspeople to have justice done. The Mayor announces, “The Claire Zachanassian endowment has been accepted… Not for the sake of the money. But for the sake of justice…” (104) and early in the play Dürrenmatt has Claire ask the Gymnast “Have you ever used your strength to strangle someone? Once Ill is killed the journalist asks what’s going on, and the Doctor responds with “heart attack” (109) a reference to the beginning of the play, when Claire advises the Doctor, to write heart attack as the cause of death next time. They were all motivated from the beginning to satisfy their part in Claire's proposal. Claires money and power gave her the ability to get ever she
Perhaps the most popular theme in the play is that of revenge. R.A. Foakes in “The Play’s Courtly Setting” explains the burden of revenge which the protagonist must carry for the duration of the play:
It is the idea of revenge that sends a cool shiver down the spines of justly men when they begin to question as to why someone would stoop to such a level. But yet it is still more than an idea for revenge has been carried out in various forms along all the eras of history side-by-side of that of novels and tragedies. Even so, revenge is still a dark scheme; an evil plague of the mind per se. It is such a plague that will turn even the greatest persons of the brightest, optimistically capable of minds into lowly, as well as lonely, individuals. Thus, revenge will, and can, only end in despair and agony of the mind. Therefore, provided that all that has been said is true, revenge would appear quite unseemly to the observant onlooker. However, taking an in-depth insight into revenge you can uncover quite a compelling feature, which is best summed up into one word. Pride. Pride is the one clear motivational proprietor needed to push a protagonist into the downward spiral of personal vendetta. Without pride, revenge is no more than a mindless massacre of flesh and bone ending in the obliteration of any hope for reconciliation.
“If you seek revenge, dig two graves.” This ancient Chinese proverb explains the mood in Hamlet, a play, written by Shakespeare. The theme of revenge is seen throughout the play as each character extracts one form or another of revenge from a person who has wronged them. In the play the characters Hamlet, Laertes, and Fortinbras all desire revenge for a lost father; however, their motivations for murder differ. Hamlet is unlike the other two characters in the way that he uses reason and logic before he acts and decides to kill his uncle, Claudius, because he is aware of the consequences.
Revenge is a recurring theme in Hamlet. Although Hamlet wants to avenge his father’s death, he is afraid of what would result from this. In the play Hamlet, Hamlet’s unwillingness to revenge appears throughout the text; Shakespeare exhibits this through Hamlet’s realization that revenge is not the right option, Hamlet‘s realization that revenge is the same as the crime which was already committed, and his understanding that to revenge is to become a “beast” and to not revenge is as well (Kastan 1).
In The Visit the author Friedrich Durrenmatt revolves around the theme of the corruption of money because it plays an important part in the progression of the story. Friedrich Durrenmatt is using Claire, a powerful billionairess to show how money can affect behavior, moral principles and politics. Claire gives the people of Güllen a big decision to make in exchange for money and the choices they are given leads them to commit murder. Claire is able to manipulate an entire town and play with the law because of her wealth. Durrenmatt shows the toll money takes on society.
Revenge is such an enormous part of a being human. It is something that no matter how much you try to avoid part of you will persistently lust for it. When you are hurt in any way your natural instinct will always tell you to make the one who hurt you feel just as bad if not worse as how you felt. It is such a natural and powerful feeling, that when revenge is incorporated into a story it makes it so much stronger. Revenge will make you see so many more sides of characters and make them seem much more complex. Revenge can give fictional characters a more human quality. That is why so many writers use it as their theme.
Through previous years, philosopher’s have tested numerous theories that help us in defining the nature of our being, often these are stalled by the nuanced thought behind our heart and mind. Philosophers often believed that we were slaves to our passions despite our reasoning, even now this could be proven by acts of love, but more than often proven it can be seen through our desire for revenge. Unlike it’s counterpart [avenge], revenge is both a verb and a noun that can be not only acted upon but attained. Revenge is what one seeks after being wronged and often an action never thought through by reason, but a fight of a person’s passions towards a self declared justice. Portrayed in a copious amount of movies, songs, and art, the theme of revenge has been held iconically within Shakespeare's most famous play, Hamlet. Centered around corruption of the mind, body and soul, Hamlet is seen by many as the embodiment of revenge through it’s characters (Hamlet, Laertes, and Fortinbras); it is within their actions and development that each character portrays the dichotomy of their passion and reason to prove that we are slaves to our passions until reason catches up.
A book or a theatrical play can become the means through which writers can express their thoughts and convey their messages to society. In ancient times, Greek tragedies were a clever way for writers to judge the political world of the time, and make society reflect back on its own behavior and way of acting. Throughout the years, the form of a theatrical play underwent many changes that allowed the writers to express themselves more freely, without being limited to the strict rules of form and structure of a Greek tragedy. Friedrich Dürrenmatt’s play The Visit is a story that is set in the modern era of post-war Europe. A woman, whose life, through an ugly series of events, is ruined, returns to her hometown to get revenge for the misery
In The Plague Camus’ characters are forced to think, reflect, and assume responsibility for living. Their self-discovery and actions demonstrate that every man can give meaning to his life by doing good deeds for the welfare of others. In the case of the plague men have to work together and do away with indifference if they are to reach the common goal. One of the purposes of Dr. Rieux’s chronicle was “. . . to state quite simply what we learn in time of pestilence: that there are more things to admire in men than to despise” (Camus 308). The plague has offered them a chance to give meaning back to their lives.
Hamlet is one of Shakespeare’s most well-known tragedies. At first glance, it holds all of the common occurrences in a revenge tragedy which include plotting, ghosts, and madness, but its complexity as a story far transcends its functionality as a revenge tragedy. Revenge tragedies are often closely tied to the real or feigned madness in the play. Hamlet is such a complex revenge tragedy because there truly is a question about the sanity of the main character Prince Hamlet. Interestingly enough, this deepens the psychology of his character and affects the way that the revenge tragedy takes place. An evaluation of Hamlet’s actions and words over the course of the play can be determined to see that his ‘outsider’ outlook on society, coupled with his innate tendency to over-think his actions, leads to an unfocused mission of vengeance that brings about not only his own death, but also the unnecessary deaths of nearly all of the other main characters in the revenge tragedy.