A Vendetta By Guy De Maupassant: Literary Analysis

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As long as people have existed, they have wronged one another. They find different ways to harm others. Those who have been wronged tend to seek revenge no matter the situation. They feel as though they must revenge. Because humans almost always seek revenge, William Shakespeare’s statement, “If you wrong us, shall we not revenge?” holds significant truth. It is the basis of revenge as a whole. Other authors, who have a focus on revenge, also agree with Shakespeare’s comments. In order to prove that Shakespeare’s statement held truth, one must comprehend what his comment symbolized. In honesty, he was rather blunt in his meaning. He believed that someone will seek revenge after being wronged. His opinion appears to present revenge as a mandatory …show more content…

In this story, Nicolas Ravolati, the villain, “treacherously stabbed” Antoine Saverini, the son of his widowed mother. The widow and her dog, Semillante, both experienced terrible grief afterwards in which lack of sleep and persistent howling became a constant. Both were inconsolable after Antoine’s murder. The loss of a loved one evidently affected both of them in traumatic ways. They were clearly wronged, which is underscored by their strong symptoms of grief. To make matters worse, the widow had “lived there alone, with her son.” Since he was murdered, she was left with nothing. She had no family members to help comfort her, which only led to her loneliness. Moreover, the neighbors were unsympathetic. They halted the use of Antoine’s name, hence any faint memory of familial connections was demolished. She simply had nothing, and that type of agony is undoubtedly a wrong unlike all others. Once again, suffering and wronging result in revenge; this is evidenced by the widow’s quest for vengeance. Because she had suffered, she trained Semillante to attack a dummy in reward for a piece of sausage. One day, the widow released Semillante on Nicolas, and the dog “dug her fangs into his throat and tore it to ribbons.” In other words, Semillante was used to obtain revenge, which is an established result of wrongs. The widow could no longer tolerate the anguish of knowing her son’s murderer continued to live without punishment. She was clearly wronged, so it makes sense that she would seek this type of