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Research Paper On Lamb To The Slaughter

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“Lamb to the Slaughter” Essay In Ronald Dahl's short story, “Lamb to the Slaughter,” Patrick Maloney tells Mary Maloney, his pregnant wife, that he has decided to leave her. This betrayal turned Mrs. Maloney, a perfect wife and soon to be mother, into a cunning murderer. Throughout the rest of the short story, Mrs. Maloney effortlessly gets away with her murder. This short story conveys a drastic trial of changes in emotions between both Mary and Patrick Maloney. At the beginning of the short story, Mary Maloney patiently waits for Patrick Maloney to arrive home. Her thoughts were filled with Mr. Maloney. She loved him with such passion, that even his presence made her happy. In the short story she exclaimed, “she loved to luxuriate in the presences of this man, and to feel-almost as a sunbather feels that sun-that make glow that came out of him to her when they were alone together” (Dahl, 1). Patrick was the only man in the world to mary. When with him, Mary was happy. Next, …show more content…

Maloney's news, Mary was sent into a wave of disbelief. This eventually turned into shock and anger. Mary could not believe the news at first, so she did what she would normally do. She began dinner. As Mary carried the lamb leg to the kitchen her mindset changed. Mary takes the lamb leg with all her force and swings it to the back of Patrick's head and kill him. This was so unexpected because we knew Mary loved Patrick so much that the readers believed she would never want to hurt him. In the story, she thought. “At that point, Mary Maloney simply walked up behind him and without any pause she swung the big frozen leg of lamb high in the air and brought it down as hard as she could on the back of his head… All right, she told herself. So i’ve killed him” (Dahl, 2-3). This quote portrays that Mrs. Maloney had no longer felt the same as she did before. After she snapped back to reality, all Mary said was that she killed him. She felt no remorse, and she just felt

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Mary Maloney is a very loving and devoted house wife and mother-to-be. Though her dream of having the perfect American family was destroyed by the bewildering news of Patrick choosing another women over Mary and their child. Innocent is all Mary Maloney is, due to her indistinct state of mind caused by her heinous husband’s decision to desert her and her child while she is unable to control her emotions due to her being pregnant. Mary is not guilty of murder instead innocent due to diminished capacity.

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Mary brought it up to the living room, he once again rejected her trying to give him food by saying he would be going out. (2) She suddenly swung the frozen leg of lamb at his head knocking him down, thinking of her consequences of killing her own husband. Mary didn’t care what the penalty was for her but she was pregnant and it worried her what would happen with her child.(2) She quickly thought about putting the leg of lamb in the oven and preparing to go out.

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The prominent reason for certainty in Mary Maloney’s case, was the fact that she was a woman. As the policmen were

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After Proceeding being told that by her husband, Mary Maloney goes out to get the supper and without any hesitation, she swings a the big frozen leg lamb at the back of Mr. Maloney’s head. The funny thing is that she had no sympathy for what she had done, instead she spent the time practicing the plan on how to cover up her crime. Her cover story indicates “When Patrick had come in, and she was sewing, and he was tired, so tired he hadn’t wanted to go out for supper. She told how she’d put the meat in the oven - it’s there now cooking - and how she’d stepped out to the grocer for vegetables, and come back to find him lying on the floor.” This shows cleverness by showing how she has thought out her plan on how to fool the her cops into thinking she has not was not been there at the time of the

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1734 Words | 7 Pages

Mary Maloney “simply walked up” behind Patrick and struck him with a “big frozen leg of lamb” “as hard as she could”. This completely contrasts the starting character of Mary as a housewife whom was patiently waiting for her husband to return home, which no one had expected. She did it “simply” which moulds an image of her not needing to think through her action, effortless and swift. The readers would be disgusted at how fast her character changes, thus suspense would be created as they would constantly question themselves about how it was possible. Additionally, after she struck her husband, she thought that it was “funny” on how “he remained standing” for a while.

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When they talk about how they “... think it’s right here on the premises” (8) or how it is “... right under their noses” (8), Mary Maloney overhears the conversation and continues on to giggle about what she has just heard. To laugh means that Mary finds humour in the situation which is a completely irrational is thought considering the circumstances. She lost her beloved husband at her own hands which would probably generate feelings of sadness, depression and guilt. Mary however feels none of these emotions. Mary Maloney’s laughter is yet another indicator that she is indeed crazy.

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Owing to the fact that she was so hurt, she to a lamb leg to the back of his head and there he went crashing onto the floor unable to move (Dahl 2). Later on that day, to cover up her tracks she called the police over to tell them of the tragic accident that happened to her husband but of course it was all a lie. To get rid of the evidence, She insisted that they stay for dinner and so they did. Mary Maloney was content because she got away with the murder of her husband and in that matter it seemed as if she enjoyed it which showed her to be even more demeted than she seemed in the

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Altogether, Mary Maloney’s traits ended up being deceiving which allowed her to get away with committing

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Both the men in each story take their wives for granted and nothing else. They see their wives not being good for anything other than cooking and being an ordinary housewife. In both stories, the women prove their husbands completely wrong in their own way. In the short story “Lamb to the Slaughter”, Mrs. Maloney was an ordinary wife expecting a baby but when her husband comes home a bears horrible news, she grows furious and kills him. Patrick Maloney came home to bear the bad news not expecting her to beat him over the head with a frozen leg of lamb.

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710 Words | 3 Pages

Mrs. Maloney, now Ms. Maloney, sobs to the police over her phone and acts as if there is no tomorrow, which there isn’t for Patrick Maloney. She speaks to the police with an emotionless tone. When we were children, we hid from our problems, we hid our favorite toys, we even hid other kids toys we thought deserved to be ours. The lamb leg is represented as our old toys that we protect and hide. “Whoever done it, they’re not going to be carrying a thing like that around… personally, I thinks it’s on the premises”.

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808 Words | 4 Pages

Without thinking a great deal about what her next action was, she grabbed a frozen lamb leg out of the freezer and brutally slammed the savory lamb leg into her dear Patrick. With him dead, she had to get rid of the evidence and have an alibi to avoid getting arrested. She cooked the meat and went to the grocer. When she returned with vegetables, she called 911 and acted as if she had no idea. When the police arrived and had searched, Mrs.Maloney fed them the murder weapon.

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Subsequently the action of the story begins to rise as Mary patently waits for her husband to return and continues to increase as it becomes clear that he is preparing to start the matter of divorce. Hence the falling action become interesting because she already killed her husband and wants to cover everything so she acts as an innocent woman as she sees her husband’s friends which are officers, and tries to hide the weapon by making them eat the leg’s lamb. Moreover, the story is expressed from the third person limited omniscient point of view so that the readers can see warmth, cleanliness, and scene of the story through Mary’s eyes. Indeed Mary has shown as a harmless domestic character at

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812 Words | 4 Pages

Mary Maloney was sitting in her living room when her husband, Patrick Maloney, came home. This was the premises of the short story, “Lamb to the Slaughter,” composed by Roald Dahl. Patrick was a police officer; his wife stayed at home, which was typical for the 1950s, which was the time period of the story. The couple had been, so it seemed, happy throughout their marriage. In fact, Mary was pregnant with a baby boy.

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1237 Words | 5 Pages

Lamb to the Slaughter is an action packed short story about a wife who is let down by her husband and proceeds to kill him as an act of revenge. Obviously much more happens in this story consisting of humour, action, mystery and irony. Roald Dahl is a master of writing short stories in ways that attract readers, draw them into what is happening through using literary elements and universal themes to make the story relatable to the readers. In this story the main literary elements were foreshadowing, situation and dramatic irony, imagery and symbolism which really drew me in and kept me attached to the story. Literary elements are what make a story powerful and attracts readers to continue reading in the story and in this story they highlight the universal theme of Revenge and Betrayal.

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467 Words | 2 Pages

What did they do? Mary didn 't know and she certainly wasn 't prepared to take a chance. ”So this means that Mary Maloney is a very ruthless person.

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