Animal Farm and Another American Tragedy
... American Tragedy”, the old man’s nephew and doctor show their corruption through greed when they fight for the old man’s money. The nephew wants his uncle’s money; he makes physical changes to himself so he can pretend to be his uncle and change the will to make himself the sole beneficiary. He gets his teeth pulled, got dentures, and attempts to trick his uncle’s doctor into thinking he was in fact the uncle, to make sure his greed was met. The doctor was also a character who was corrupted by greed in this short story. He was originally supposed to be the one to inherit the old man’s money, because the old man wasn’t very fond of his young nephew, and knew what kind of person he was. The doctor knew what the nephew was trying to do, and made sure that things were taken care of so that he was the one to receive the money that the uncle owned. One of the main reasons that the pigs in Animal Farm, and some of the characters in “Another American Tragedy” were corrupted was money. In Animal Farm, the pigs go back on their word to never trade with humans, and do exactly that. They force the animals to give up what they worked hard for, and also make the hens give up their eggs for extra money: “From now onwards, Animal Farm would engage in trade with the neighbouring farms: not, of course, for any commercial purpose, but simply in order to obtain certain materials which were urgently necessary. The needs of the windmill must override everything else, he said. He was therefore making arrangements to sell a stack of hay and part of the current year’s wheat crop, and later on, if more money were needed, it would have to be made up by the sale of eggs, for which there was always a market in Willingdon. The hens, said Napoleon, should welcome this sacrifice as their own special contribution towards the building of the windmill.” (Orwell, pg. 56) The pigs were so corrupted by money that they sold Boxer to the horse slaughterer for more of it. The nephew, doctor, and dentist in “Another American Tragedy” were all corrupted by money. When the nephew asked to have all of his teeth removed, despite the fact that there was nothing wrong with them, the dentist refused. It wasn’t until the nephew offered the dentist a roll of money that he changed his mind, claiming that he was only doing it because “mental derangement is caused by dental derangement.” (Collier, pg. 54) The nephew had concocted a complicated plan in order to get his uncle’s money. He got his teeth pulled and purchased dentures in order to imitate his uncle. He was going to kill his uncle; pretend to be him long enough to change the will in order to ensure that he received all of the money, and then place his uncle’s dead body back in his bed. When they found the old man dead, and read the will, it would say that everything was to go to his nephew. However, the old man’s doctor was originally the beneficiary of everything, so when he found out about the nephew’s plan, he took the necessary steps to make sure that he didn’t lose the money that was supposed to go to him. Money made many characters in both Animal Farm and “Another American Tragedy” do terrible things they usually wouldn’t do. What seemed to be one of the main themes in both stories was violence. The main characters in both Animal Farm and “Another American Tragedy” all showed corruption by the violence they used towards others. In Animal Farm...