“The Monkey’s Paw”
After reading “The Monkey’s Paw”, I couldn’t help but make a connection between this story and Aladdin. In Disney’s version of Aladdin, a genie appears and grants three wishes to the riff- raff Aladdin. Similarly, the talisman in Jacob’s story also held the power to grant three wishes, but in a more twisted, awful, and coincidental manner. What I found most interesting about the story was finding out whether the paw would be able to bring Herbert back to life. Split into three sections, the story was cleverly crafted with a clear introduction/background, main event, and conclusion while still leaving room for wonder and intrigue. People always saw, “everything happens for a reason” and for some reason we always come across those times when we have “good news and bad news”. Sometimes, even, we try to force things to come out a certain way, that even our most rigorous efforts fail no matter we try. The universal theme of, never wish anything but what you have because you could be worse off is one that is very prominent in “The Monkey’s Paw” and having such a distinct theme makes the story work well. Setting up such a thorough and concise background history on the paw also allowed the reader to gain a better understanding of what could happen in the story, allowing the reader to infer the possibilities of the story’s ending. And of course, the obvious question, was Herbert really going to be brought back to life? Was it him at the door, knocking incessantly? What bad news would Herbert’s revival bring back if Mr. White had not reached the talisman in time?