Your assignment is to read four short stories and make connections between their themes/motifs/images and those of V for Vendetta. Post your response to at least two of the stories in a single blog post below. Your response need not be formal, but should be substantive - i.e. it doesn't need to be fancy, just thoughtful and interesting.
First, read both of these VERY short Edgar Allan Poe stories: "The Oval Portrait" "The Masque of the Red Death" Next, read two of these science fiction short stories: "Repent Harlequin! said the Ticktock Man" by Harlan Ellison (the story that inspired Alan Moore to create V) "Harrison Bergeron" by Kurt Vonnegut (or if you already read that, try his related story "2BR02B" instead) Finally, comment on ONE of Poe's stories and ONE of the scifi stories in relation to V for Vendetta. What similar ideas or images does it evoke? How does reading the two pieces "together" influence your interpretations?
23 Comments
Suubi Mondesir
12/31/2015 02:04:05 pm
Edgar Allen Poe's short story, "The Masque of the Red Death" relates to "V for Vendetta", because both depicted how darkness or evil can previal. "The Masque of the Red Death" was about a plague and how prince Pospero protected only the castle from the diesase, ignoring everyone who was dieing outside of the castle walls. After several months the prince hosted a Masquerade ball with beauitful rooms of stain glass, each one color. However an unexpected masked guess arrived. It was not a person but the plague itself and everyone died including the prince. This connects to "V for Vendetta" because both stories used chaos as a means of finding a "solution". Both also used masks for symbolism and showed humans true nature, self- preservation. For example the prince made sure he was safe from the plague and didn't care about any ones else's well being. And finally both stories eliminated the party responsible.
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Olivia Smelas
1/2/2016 12:04:45 pm
Edgar Allan Poe's "Masque of the Red Death" parallels V for Vendetta in a few very interesting ways. In V for Vendetta, pre-revolution, the voice of Fate, Louis Prothero, would make his daily addresses to the people, telling them exactly when it would rain, current happenings, and other information. Fate never addressed the actual problems in their society in his radio speeches, he only spewed propaganda and the time it would rain that day. Despite all these horrible things happening in V's society, the voice of Fate continued to talk about unimportant issues and government promotions, and addressed the community as if nothing was happening, nothing was wrong. One could almost say this is similar to how Prospero dealt with the Red Death in his community... Ignoring his struggling the people, he took the elites, sheltered them, and threw a party... He completely ignored the problem at hand instead choosing to party and let them die in the streets, much like the voice of Fate ignored the problems in society instead choosing to talk to the people about the weather and propaganda campaigns. I have to wonder if the authors of V for Vendetta considered this classic Poe story when naming the voice of Fate... Prothero, Prospero... Like you could compare Prothero to Prospero, you could also compare the intruder dressed as the red death to V. The intruder interrupted the elitist party and acted as a reminder to the people at the party of what was happening outside the lavish gathering, death, death, and more death. Prospero's death, death of a leader, combined with royal ignorance to the problems at hand would likely cause some kind of revolution. Similarly, V was a wake up call to his community. V's actions eventually led to a collapse of all government and social order, consequently, revolution. Moving on to the next story, Harrison Bergeron. One could easily compare the Handicapper General, Diana Moon Glampers to the Leader. As Glampers hates when Bergeron and the ballerina kiss, she also seems to hate strength, intelligence and beauty, the Leader despises the acknowledgement of love or emotions. The Leader is in love with a machine, same as Glampers hates love. All the connections between V for Vendetta and various pieces of literature in all genres reveal its startling accuracy and prevalence even in today's society.
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Biggs
1/3/2016 07:13:22 pm
Prothero/Prospero! Awesome connection. Both of them willing, even eager to sacrifice tons of real life to protect their artificial possessions and walled-in homes. (This is even truer of prothero in the film, I think.)
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Willow Martin
1/3/2016 11:33:16 am
The Oval Portrait
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Hannah Daitz
1/3/2016 11:48:51 am
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Olivia Jordan
1/3/2016 01:58:30 pm
The Oval Portrait
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Trey Soya
1/3/2016 03:36:35 pm
Edgar Allen Poe's "The Mask of The Red Death" relates to "V for Vendetta". I think of Prince Pospero as Susan because both love power and control. The Prince also avoided problems like the Red Death just like how Susan avoided V and both were more concerned about themselves rather than their people. V and the Red Death were shown as the destroyers of society. "Harrison and Bergeron" by Kurt Vonnegut's has many similarities to "V for Vendetta" too. Both stories have a fascism rule and everything is cut to chase. I thought about how the television no longer showed Emperor and the Empress and society then forgot about what just happened. The government wouldn't want the people to see rebellion, they wanted to keep the world just the same. Similarly, the the government tried to hide V from the people because they didn't want chaos and anarchy.
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Erin Ostrowski
1/3/2016 05:21:35 pm
Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Masque of the Red Death” resembles V for Vendetta in multiple ways. For example, V represents an idea, anarchism, and is not human after being tested on. In this short story, the figure that joins the masquerade ball at the end is simply an idea, or in this case, a disease. They both infiltrate a smoothly run society and flip everything upside down. Also, in both stories, the elites of the society are put above everyone else and the commoners are left to suffer. In V for Vendetta it was in concentration camps and the constant surveillance, while in The Masque of the Red Death it was a disease, killing everyone it comes in contact with. The ordinary people must suffer through these hardships, but the elites are sheltered from it all. Continually, the evil causing the people to suffer eventually turn right around on the elites and they get what they deserve in both stories; in V it was the anarchism prevailing and in the Red Death it was the disease penetrating their safe haven and killing all of the elites. As you can see, there are many similarities in these two stories.
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Kelly Farley
1/3/2016 05:39:18 pm
Edgar Allan's, "The Masque of the Red Death" and Harlan Ellison's "Repent Harlequin! said the Ticktock Man" both relate to "V for Vendetta". In Allan's story, Prince Prospero and his favorite citizens who trapped themselves inside his castle for protection from the Red Death. These people believed they were above all the chaos going on in the rest of the kingdom caused by this Red Death. When the masked guest arrives to their party in the castle, they soon realize that this is not a guest but actually the Red Death itself. Prince Prospero, along with the others all die thus realizing that they are not above the chaos being caused by the disease. In "V for Vendetta", the government officials believed they were higher than the total control being forced on the city. They thought that because they were controlling the citizens, they were not the ones being controlled. By the end of the book, many of these government officials soon find out that they are the ones under the most control, they were the most brainwashed citizens. In "Repent Harlequin! said the Ticktock Man", I found the actions of the Ticktock Man to resemble those of V. They both have the ability to control or manipulate their societies. Also, the rules do not apply to them, they are what is considered "above the law". In both of these stories, the societies comply with the rules because of fear. They all fear the death that would soon come if they were to disobey the rules of their society.
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Ford Zacks
1/3/2016 06:14:00 pm
Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Oval Portrait” and “The Masque of the Red Death” can be compared to Alan Moore’s “V for Vendetta” in many ways. In “The Oval Portrait”, the painter is similar to Adam Susan. Susan becomes obsessed with an inanimate object, FATE, and forgets all about real life. He does not care about his people, he only cares for a computer. The painter in the story becomes obsessed with a painting of his wife. He is so blinded by his love for his work that he loses his wife. These are very similar situations. Both men lost sight of what was truly important and instead fell in love with something that was not real. In both cases this mistake led to a tragic end. In “The Masque of the Red Death” the character of Red Death can be compared to V himself. In this story, Prince Prospero takes a select few people and walls them off from the rest of the world so they will not be exposed to the Red Death, a terrible terminal disease. The Prince creates a perfect world for these people in the walls. This is similar to what Adam Susan has claimed to do in “V for Vendetta”. Susan has walled everyone in his world off from anything that can make them think differently from the way he wants them to. The Prince is trying to keep the Red Death away from his people. Then Red Death makes an appearance. If V is an example of what Susan does not want in his world, then aren’t V and the Red Death very similar. They both bring chaos into a closed society that was supposedly perfect. They both cleanse with destruction. They penetrate a system that was supposed to be built for protecting against them. This leads to the question, was Susan’s world built to protect from people or things like V?
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Ford Zacks
1/3/2016 06:30:54 pm
Kurt Vonnegut Jr.’s “Harrison Bergeron” can be compared to the use of media in “V for Vendetta”. The handicaps that are used in the story to make all people equal have the same effect as the false media in “V for Vendetta”. In the novel when V destroys Parliament, the government tries to make something up to make sure the public does not know what actually happened. In “Harrison Bergeron” the handicaps do that for the government. Either no one is smart enough to understand what they saw on the television or the ones that are smart enough have handicaps that prevent them from doing so. This theme of extremely an extremely strong and controlling government is shared between the novel and the short story.
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Biggs
1/3/2016 06:31:58 pm
It seems like both Prospero and Susan want to keep "people" in general away, to replace unpredictable life with something they can control - same with the painter, he wants to turn life into "art" so it stops living and breathing. Are ALL these systems built essentially to turn life into an object that can be manipulated - in other words, to make them means to an end, not ends in themselves?
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Sydney Gannon
1/3/2016 06:15:02 pm
"The Masque of the Red Death" by Edgar Allan Poe made me think of "V for Vendetta" in multiple ways. Prince Prospero reminded me of the leader wanting order everywhere and having the different parts of the government like the nose and the eye as seen in the short story as the different rooms. He also attempts to avoid the Red Death and the leader, i believe, was avoiding finding a real person to love, so he only loved the fate computer. Harlan Ellison's "'Repent, Harlequin!' said the Ticktockman" also related to "V for Vendetta" in the sense that everyone had to follow by the rules given, and most did because they knew someone was watching over them at all times. If they did not go by these said rules, they would be punished. Together they influence my interpretations because they relate to the same grouping pf characters in "V for Vendetta", the government, and how they rule/control the people and watch over them.
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Biggs
1/3/2016 06:29:38 pm
Three rulers so obsessed with power they literally can't value human life as anything other than a tool.
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Shelley Banfield
1/3/2016 06:30:04 pm
In Edgar Allan Poe's "The Oval Portrait", a painter paints his wife's portrait for an unknowingly long period of time. He doesn't notice time withering her away until it is too late, the portrait is done, and she is dead. This relates to 'V for Vendetta' since Evey made the same mistake as the painter and the same mistake as the painter's wife. V and Evey had the ability to change character and break gender roles by not abiding by societal restrictions. They exhibit this by morphing into two opposing characters in Edgar Allan Poe's characters, the painter and his wife. Evey was the woman in the portrait essentially being painted by V. V was trying to recreate himself in another life (Evey's) and by doing this, he drained his own life therefore taking upon himself the role of the painter's wife. Evey represents the painter's wife as she was being morphed into this painting which would live on but she also took on the painter's role as she found V, her painter's wife and painter, dead. The science fiction story 'Harrison Bergeron" relates to 'V for Vendetta' since the people in the story escaped their constraints just like V and Evey. Society had placed them in a system where they all had to be mediocre in order to work together. Harrison broke away from this system and guided others to do the same, just as the idea of V had done. After escaping their societal chains and restrictions, the people were free to act as they would under anarchy for a little, just as V would have wanted. Although in the end, everything returned back to normal and in the end of 'V for Vendetta', we don't know exactly what happens but there's a possibility of it returning to normal. Both stories show the governments oppressive nature within the society.
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Will Spencer
1/3/2016 06:57:25 pm
While reading the short story "The Oval Portrait" by Edger Allen Poe and Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut, I did in fact see a correlation between these stories and the book "V for Vendetta". In "The Oval Portrait", the painter paints an image of his wife. This painter has been with his wife for many years, and loves her dearly. However, he becomes more and more drawn to this painting. It was something about the portraits facial details that triggered the painters love for his work, but it drew him farther away from his actual wife. As time passed, he cared more about the painting than he cared about his own wife, which is very sad. This can relate to V for Vendetta in many ways, but primarily the ways of power. The fascist setting in V for Vendetta calls for many characters to be very powerful. These characters such as Finch and Susan, become so drawn to all this power that they forget about the greater good, which is making the nation a better place. In the short story "Harrison Bergeron", many things go on that can be tied to V for Vendetta. The main character in this story, Harrison Bergeron, can be related to V in many ways. First off, they both have plans to over throw the government. They also both escaped form a high security prison. Both characters live in a secure world, where the government watches every move. Harrison has a rebellious mind, and so does V. Both these stories express relations toward V for Vendetta, and it's very interesting to make connections.
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Brad Chavero
1/3/2016 07:30:29 pm
Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Oval Portrait” links back very similarly to V from V For Vendetta. Both texts touch upon the fact of idolizing/acknowledging other people. In Poe’s story, the narrator is said to have taken notice of this painting of a very pretty woman and that it appeared so life like taking his time to appreciate the art piece. Meanwhile in V For Vendetta, V in a way idolized Valorie as he is caught in some panels watching her on a huge movie screen and giving out roses for her. V’s motives especially come in directly from Valorie’s words from their time “together” in the numbered rooms while the harsh government was in power. Both texts have to do with this idea that other people we look up to can affect us. In Poe’s story, the woman’s picture lead to the narrator spending time wanting to know about why her beauty seemed so lifelike leading him to spend his own time growing attached to the painting and its origins on the painter. In V’s story, V’s values and passion on wanting to be set free and on overthrowing the government came from his lessons learned from Valorie. She was his inspiration (to want to fight back), motivation (to actually take action), and idol (he watched her face on a big screen).
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Keira Albano
1/4/2016 04:29:09 am
Edgar Allen Poe's "The Oval Portrait" is about a painter creating a image of his wife, while her lifespan is ending, in the end she is dead and he is left with the painting. This reminds me of "V for Vendetta" as facism representing the wife, while anarchy representing painting, and women in general representing government. One government was replaced with the other. While the painter symbolizes key people in the creation of anarchy like V, and Eve. Harrison Bergeron" is also tied to V. For example, they both have plans to overthrow the government. Also, they both represent resistance in authority, V showing the people to stand up for themselves while Harrison decided to try to free the dancers.
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Matthew Vaderveer
1/4/2016 04:21:05 pm
The “Red death” is devastating the country is similar to the devastation of the nuclear war in V for Vendetta. In this short story while many people are suffering the upper class is happy and light hearted. This is shown in V as well, the lower class is treated unfairly under the governments control while the government is free to do what they want. The portrayed image of where the prince and his friends partied sounds familiar to the shadow gallery. In this short story orchestra music is mentioned, similarly V listened to orchestra music alone and he played it out while he blew up buildings. It seems like one person broke into the higher class party where the disease had not spread and purposely spread the disease. This is exactly like how V brought down the higher class knowing he was going to die in the process.
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Kay Franzese
1/4/2016 04:35:07 pm
In Edger Allen Poe's "The Oval Portrait", the painter and his wife resemble characters in the story "V for Vendetta". The painter and Adam Susan are similar because they become so in love with something other than a person. Susan fell in love with his computer and the painter fell in love with his work. They become obsessed with their true love that they forgot about the world around them. The painter was so obsessed with the painting of his wife that he didn't even notice that she was dying while posing for the portrait. Susan was obsessed with his computer and mainly focused on his computer when the world he created was crumbling around him. Also, the painter's wife resembles the people of London in "V for Vendetta". The painter's wife resented posing for the painting because she wanted her husband to focus on her instead of his work, but she posed for the portrait anyway. The people of London resented the leader, but they gave him their power because they wanted no responsibility. Both the people of London and the painter's wife were in situations where they could realize that their leader's actions are extreme and controlling. The only difference between the two is that the people of London had V who forced them to realize that they can leave and overthrow the leader where as the painter's wife did not.
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Tyhler Harty
1/5/2016 04:31:00 am
Both "Harrison Burgeron" and "V for Vendetta" are very similar stories. In both stories they have oppressive governments that control the people and limit their freedom of speech. The two main characters from the stories Harrison and V both show distaste for the governments power over the people. Also they hate that the people are willing to take this kind of oppression.
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Luke Devine
1/5/2016 08:37:11 am
In both Oval Portrait and V for Vendetta the ideas of anarchy are represented. The main idea is of the Creator and the Destroyer, the two main people in Anarchy. The woman is similar to the Facist government. The portrait is similar to a new government of Anarchy. V and Evey are the painter, being the Destroyer and dismantling the government and the woman. At the same time they are the creator, creating a new, free government.
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Ash Riegler
1/5/2016 02:02:04 pm
After reading Poe's 'The Oval Portrait' one could see many ways in which it relates to that of 'V for Vendetta'. For example- in this poem the painter becomes so obsessed with creating this painting that he completely fails to worry for his quickly fading wife. This could be compared to that of the leader in V, Adam Susan. As Susan becomes more and more obsessed with 'Fate' the computer he ignores more and more of the actual problems faced everyday by his people. But then again one could also say that V himself is the painter, too obsessed with his own idea of they way things should be that he doesn't even realize, or perhaps he does, that he is hurting Evey. Even if he thinks it's for the better. In the case of the scifi story the Ticktockman, that figure could be seen in relation to either Evey or V's character. Evey more so in the fact that the Ticktock man is not violent and V in the sense that he is trying to change something through this sense of anarchy.
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