“Genesis and catastrophe” is the title of a short-story from the very famous and popular writer Roald Dahl. The story is about a woman who goes to the hospital to have a baby. She already had given birth to three children but all the three of them died. And because of that she couldn’t believe the doctor when he said that she would have a healthy baby. Se is very sure about the fact that also this baby will die, just like the other ones did. After the doctor asked the woman how this child will be named, she answered him that its name will be Adolf. When her husband with its last name Hitler(!), a real alcoholic person, is in the hospital to pay her a visit, he thinks the new baby is a very weak and little baby. He isn’t very pleased about the physical conditions of this baby. The doctor is trying to convince the husband of the woman, but it didn’t worked out well. After you knew that the last name of the baby would be Hitler, you instantly knew that this baby will become a terrible man, who actually shouldn’t have been born.
There are a few characters in this story. You have the innkeeper’s wife, the husband of the mother which has given birth to the baby, the mother, the doctor and of course the baby. You don’t know very much about the innkeeper’s wife, only that she is taking care of the baby which has just been born. You could say that she is a flat character. Ms Hitler is actually the most important character in this story. She is a young woman which have been sad the whole time in the story and people have never seen her laugh. She is very friendly and also very religious. There are a lot terrible things that she has experienced, like the death of her previous children and she also has to live with a difficult alcoholic husband. Alois Hitler is the name of her husband. He is a alcoholic person and doesn’t seem to care a lot about his wife and the death of their previous children. He is a big, arrogant man and sometimes you can see an image of Adolf Hitler in some certain things that he does. You can consider this character as a flat and technical one. The doctor in the story is also an important character. And because of that we consider him as a round and functional character. A reason why he
is very important in the story is because he gets all the information about the situation, for example: he has to tell the father about the baby. But still, he is a neutral and ordinary character. He is very anxious about the woman because she is so worried about the baby. The baby is also a character in this story, he is a normal baby and considered as a technical and non-round character.
In the story there is only one place the characters are staying the whole time, namely in a place where Ms Hitler lies after giving birth to a baby. The place where these characters are, isn’t very important in this story. The conversations between these characters are, however, very important.
The writer also uses a very special kind of language. Before you know that the baby is going to be the Adolf Hitler, the writer gives a lot of tips and hints in the story to refer to it. When you analyse the character which plays the father of the baby, you can see an image of Adolf Hitler in it. Also the way he refers to specimens (l.120-121), gives us an idea about the way Adolf was, just think about his so called powerful “Aryan race”. The writer also uses irony in the story. One of the most ironic things in the story is when the mother says: “Oh God, be merciful unto him” (l.247-248) Because one of the things God shouldn’t be doing is being merciful unto Hitler. Another ironic sentence in this story is when the doctor says: ”(...) he will be probably be talking his head off(...)” (l.135-36).
When you read the story you see the story true a camera-eye, a neutral narrator. You can follow the conversations between the different characters in the story. Beside the fact that you see the story true a camera-eye, you also get a little bit extra information about the story. eg: The husband was a drunkard(...) (l.38-39).
The theme of the story is about life and death. Every mother is happy with a healthy child, in the situation of frau Hitler all the three of her previous children had died. That’s why she couldn’t believe that Adolf would keep living. And like we all know, Hitler has lived tó long. You can call this a twist of faith. So when you analyse the story in a way you want to discover the thematics of the story, you can see a contradiction between one side he is the only child who kept living and on the other side as a grown man he has decided about life and death.
After reading this story I can say that it is a very nice story. A lot of surprisingly elements are also present in the story. The most surprisingly element in this story is the moment when you discover that the baby which have just been born is actually Adolf Hitler. Because you think you are reading about a nice little baby, but the baby turned out to be one of the most terrible men in history. I think that the emotions of Ms Hitler were described very clever. You can feel her emotions and also her distrusts about the baby. I think that is one of the most splendid things the writer has used in the story, because you can really sympathise with the characters.
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