Most Dangerous Game Character Analysis

In Richard Connell’s “The Most Dangerous Game,” Sanger Rainsford is forced to test his survival skills while he is intensely hunted by an experienced war general named General Zaroff. In this story, Rainsford exhibits some very helpful characteristics like his resourcefulness, his strategic planning, and his ability to reason. As a result of Rainsford’s questioning the validity of General Zaroff’s hunting methods, he ended up playing in the game. Although I believe Rainsford is a very helpful, interesting, and dynamic character, at the end of the story, he must give up his own personal morals to win the game.

In the jungle, Rainsford knows that he must think outside the box. General Zaroff has already read all of Rainsford’s books

When he first fell off of his yacht and into the water, he wanted to thrash about like an animal and swim crazily back to shore for help, but instead he started swimming “with slow, deliberate strokes, conserving his strength. He began to count his strokes; he could do possibly a hundred more…” (218). So in that moment, Rainsford was able to reason with himself and control his urge to thrash about the water. Instead, he moved with agility. In another instance, when Rainsford was hiding from General Zaroff, he had to convince himself not to regress to those animal-like instincts that he had developed. The text says “Rainsford’s impulse was to hurl himself down like a panther, but he saw the general’s right hand held something metallic—a small automatic pistol.” (231). As you can tell from the text, Rainsford really wanted to jump down from his hiding spot and attack the general, but he couldn’t. If he had done so, he would end up losing the game. Then, near the end of the story, Rainsford is running from the General and his pack and he sees the ocean shore and it’s deep waters below. “Rainsford hesitated. He heard the hounds. Then he leaped far out into the sea…” (235). Again, Rainsford had to reason with himself. When he heard the pounding paws of the pack and the heavy breathing of the general, he knew that he would have to jump. These reasons are why I believe that Rainsford’s ability to reason is a very important and helpful characteristic and it played a very important role in his survival on Ship Trap