Short Story and Surprising Events Essay

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In the story “Poison” by Roald Dahl who is a very talented writer that has written many successful stories in the past. In all of his stories, he uses techniques such as making the story filled with mysterious events to confuse the reader and keep them from guessing, slow pace then starts speeding up creating a heart pounding suspense. Lastly but not least, he adds surprising events to shock the reader and keep them up and going. Overall, these techniques help make the story more interesting and pull the reader in further into the story. One of the way he uses structured text to create mystery in the story is when, “Timber notice his light was still on, he went up the stairs carefully in the dark”. This clearly shows that something happened to his friend because his light was on at an unusual time. Another example would be when Timber was walking towards his room, and he saw “Harry lying in bed but didn’t turn his head to greet him” Later, Harry started to spoke slowly “Stop. Wait a moment, Timber”. “He could hardly hear him because he seemed to be straining to get the words out” The author did a great job in creating mystery because now he leaves the reader confuse as to why Harry was straining to get his words out. In addition, “A krait managed to get on top of Harry but he hasn’t been bitten yet”. The author wrote this line to keep the reader wondering why the krait hasn’t bitten him yet which leads to more mystery. All of these examples had an impact on the reader by confusing them and making the story less predictable. Not only does he uses structured text to create mystery, but also manipulates time to create tension. In the story, Harry was speaking slowly and whispering, “Timber, Timber, Come here”. This shows us that the story was starting out slowly. When Timber realized there was a krait on Harry, he said, “We got to be quick. Come on now, quickly, tell where it bit you”. The author did a great job in using the word “quickly” to tell us that the story was speeding up which is a great example of time manipulation. Another example would be when, “Harry was lying there very still and tense as though he was holding in the pain”. This clearly shows us that he was in a very dangerous situation and that the pain was too much for him. After receiving the serum intravenously, Overtime the serum became less effective to protect harry. The author did an excellent job in telling us that the serum was a great way to protect Harry but it becomes less effective overtime which is also a great example of time manipulation. These events had an impact on the reader by starting the story slowly at first but then speeding up creating a heart pounding suspense and get the reader to think what could possibly be the outcome of the story. Finally, the last way he uses structured text to create surprise in the story is when, “Timber wonder why Harry hasn’t been bitten yet”. A great example would be when Timber and Dr.
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