I read Kurt Vonnegut’s short story named Harrison Bergeron. It was confusing story about society’s future. The story sets in 2081. It tells about mankind, where everybody is finally equal and everything is in order. No one is smarter, stronger, better-looking or faster than anyone else. Equality is the thing number one. If you are more beautiful than anybody else, you have to use mask in front of your face. If you are little bit smarter than anybody else, you have to use headphones which you hear some irritating sounds that you can’t to focus anything. You even have to use heavy weights to slow down, if you are too strong or too fast. The government calls these instruments ”handicaps”.

In the story there is a couple named George and Hazel who have a boy Harrison. The boy is too much everything. He is very good looking, smart and strong and quick too. Harrison’s mother Hazel Bergeron cannot think deeply about anything, but boy’s father George is little bit smarter so he has to use headphones. There is at least one person, who has more authority than other people. Her name is Diana Moon Glamber. She is ”Hadicapper General”.

Harrison is the fourteen-year-old. The Handicapper General forces him to wear the most extreme handicaps. Harrison has to carry three hundred pounds of additional weight to impede his strength and he must wear a red rubber nose and black caps for his teeth to make him less handsome. That’s not enough. That’s why he has jailed by the Handicapper General’s office. Harrison escapes from jail and go straight to the TV studio. There is going on ballerinas dance show. When he arrives to studio he undress all his handicaps and start to talk about society’s madness. He call himself an emperor and choose a ballerina to empress for him. They dance in television like lovebirds and be happy. Then Harrison killed by Diana Moon Glampers when she shoots a ten gauge shotgun into him.

Hazel and George are watching ballerinas dance on TV. George, who has left the room to get a beer, returns and asks Hazel why she has been crying. She says that something sad happened on TV. She has just seen that her son killed on TV, but she cannot remember it after few seconds after happening. George urges her not to remember sad things. A noise sounds in George’s head, and Hazel says it sounded like a doozy. He says she can say that again, and she repeats that it sounded like a doozy.

Vonneguts sentences are short and easily understood. His story includes social and political critique. The story includes an anti-communism message. Vonnegut tells his story with humor. Even the most horrifying scenes are underlined by jokes or absurdity.

The story plot tells to guys called Tigo and Danny, and they are in the basement the whole story. The reason why they are in there is that they are both part of different gang. There have been conflict between the gangs, and they put Tigo and Danny solve the problem by playing Russian roulette.
First they try to be tough guys and not showing that they are scared. But the more times they have pull the trigger, the emotional the conversation is turning. They started to talk about their personal life. They are making plants that they will see after this, even if they know that one of them will not survive. After few ineffectual shots they decide to put one bullet more into gun. Still it doesn’t work, so they put still one more. It will flow to Dannys destiny.
Text is almost entirely dialog between mans. They are noticing that they have common features, and what further the story goes, the more they get know each other and starting to be friend. The fact that Danny asked Tigo to go lake whit him shown that they really were started to like each others, and even that they were different gangs, didn’t mind. They know that it will separate them both from the gangs.
I thinks that characters joined gangs because they have been money problem, so they are have to do something to earn money and protection. Maybe they are not enjoyed to be in a gang, but it have began their “family”. Now when they realize that they don’t need to be in a gang anymore, they are planning what would it like to have a friend from an other gang. Maybe their life is better than before, and they could survive without the gang.

The last spin is a short story featured in open road, written by Evan Hunter. Putting it briefly it’s a story about two guys, Tigo and Danny, who have been chosen to settle a fight between their gangs ( which they refer to as ’clubs’ ).  Instead of an actual fight they have been ordered to settle things up by paying a game called russian roulette, a game of chance in which the winner is the one who is lucky enough to stay alive.

There was supposed to be a truce between the gangs, but Danny’s side made the mistake to ignore that, leading to the situation described in the story. The boys are sitting in front of a table in a cold basement room, ready to begin their game. They start out as enemies, not because they had something personal against each other but because that’s how it was supposed to be. Being in different gangs made them automatically enemies. Neither of them wants to show their actual feelings to the other but as they take turns in shooting ( at first with only one cartridge in one of the six cylinders, later two and three ) they start to chat with each other, and each time they pull the trigger they get to know each other a bit better. They talk about their life, family, girlfriends and dreams and soon they notice they actually have a lot in common. Both of the guys start to get reluctant to go on, but quitting now is not an option. Suddenly Tigo asks excitedly if Danny has ever been rowboating on the nearby lake, telling him he should definitely try it sometime. Tigo pulls the trigger once more, staying alive, and as he passes the gun to Danny they agree they were actually lucky they got the chance to meet each other. Grinning they decide to end the game after one more shot and Danny invites his new friend to the lake next sunday. The guys smile at each other, Danny pulls the trigger, and in the few next seconds the explosion rips away half of his face. Tigo rests his head on the table sobbing, and the story comes to an end.

Overall the text was pretty easy to read since It mostly consists of the boy’s dialogue. The colloquial language they used fits well with the atmosphere of the story but was a bit difficult to understand at some parts. (For example the world diddlebop was kind of weird) During the story they realize they have no reason to stay with their gangs. At first both act cool and tough, but later they start to relax. Danny and Tigo realize they only joined the gangs because they were the gangs of their streets, not because they liked their so called ’friends’ there. The gangs were controlling their lives and using them to get power, but together they make the decision to stop taking orders from them. When Danny invites Tigo to come to the lake with him the both of them let go of their roles as gang members completely, and grin together happily and openly as they know they had both finally gotten a friend who they could trust. The ending is what makes the story kind of tragic, it’s a really good ending in my opinion.

I chose a short story by Alecia McKenzie, because it seemed quite interesting. Full Stop is a story about Carmen and her Grandmother Scottie, who has raised Carmen and her brother Richard. It’s also a story about the ice cold relationship between mother and daughter. The story consists of letters which Carmen and Scottie send to each other. Through letters reader can form an image of the characters’ lives.

Carmen is almost thirty years old woman who is married to Normy. In her letters Scottie writes about “hubby” referring to Normy and asks Carmen to give regards to him. Carmen and Normy live in New York. Carmen is raised by her Grandmother because her parents weren’t able to do it by themselves. Carmen’s parents were really young when Carmen was born, so this arrangement was quite necessary. Nevertheless, Carmen’s mother is stubbornly trying to contact her daughter. Carmen isn’t happy about that because she doesn’t consider her as a mother and her mother is completely strange to her. That’s also the reason why Carmen by herself doesn’t want to contact her mother or in any way be in touch with her.

Scottie is Carmen and Richard’s Grandmother. Scottie and Carmen write letters to each other quite a lot. Carmen sends money enclosed to her almost every letter for some specific purpose but Scottie spends the money always to something else or puts the money in the bank. For example, Carmen sends money to Scottie for getting a painter, but Scottie decides to paint her house by herself because she thinks that painters can’t do the job right and she would have to do it anyway. Carmen also sends money to Scottie for putting up some burglar bars, but Scottie needs a dress to funeral so she buys a dress instead of the burglar bars. Scottie asks Carmen to visit her in almost every letter she sends. Scottie is a little worried about her time in the earth and she would like to get to know Carmen’s husband before she passes away.

Richard – or Richie – is mentioned in the text a couple of times. He is Carmen’s little brother. Grandma Scottie is waiting a letter from him but Richie is too busy to write. When he finally sends a letter to Scottie, he writes that he has worked overtime and just moved into a new apartment. However, Scottie is a little doubting about the reasons why he hasn’t written earlier. I think that there may be many different reasons why Richard doesn’t keep in touch with Scottie. Maybe he is telling the truth and he just simply is too busy to write. Or maybe he isn’t that much into writing. But I think it’s more likely that Richard has just never found his relationship with Scottie close enough to be in touch with her.

The way that Grandma Scottie writes her letters is rather interesting. She writes everything without any punctuation. It isn’t explained in any point why is she doing like that. Maybe it’s something in her personality. Maybe she just isn’t interested enough to pay attention to them. Or maybe she is not that educated to know how to use punctuation. That’s why it’s really weird that it’s so huge a problem to her when Carmen writes her first letter without any punctuation. Scottie even seems to be a little disappointed in her because of that. But why should Carmen use punctuation if Scottie doesn’t use them by herself?

Grandma Scottie writes a lot about God and she uses phrases from Bible. She strongly believes that The Lord will take care of everything. At first Scottie seems to be a good Christian. She believes in God, she prays, she knows phrases from Bible, etc. But is that enough? Are you really a good Christian if you know Bible by heart? I don’t think so. What about charity and forgiveness? I think that those are the most important Christian virtues. Nevertheless, Scottie is comparing her own daughter to “a snake in the grass” and she even seems to be a little disappointed in her. Scottie didn’t like Carmen’s father either. However, she tells Carmen that she should forgive “seven times seven” like God has said. So why isn’t she doing that by herself? I think that Scottie has a little bit different values that Christianity represents. That’s why I think that Scottie isn’t a good Christian.

It’s quite obvious that Scottie doesn’t like much her daughter. I get a feeling from the text that Scottie is trying to manipulate Carmen against her mother. Scottie keeps telling Carmen that she can’t trust her mother and that Carmen’s mother is a liar. Despite that, Scottie always tells Carmen to write her mother. Is she trying to make amends for something? And who is right in the end? In the last letter Grandma doesn’t explain properly what has actually happened between her and her daughter. I think that Carmen’s mother has some point in her accusation. Why would she fake all that? Because her guilty conscience? Yes, maybe, but not entirely. There must have been some disagreement in some point. But if Carmen’s mother would really have wanted to have her kids back, she would have worked harder because she does have a legal right to her own children. I believe both stories partly and I think that there is something true in both versions of events. Grandma Scottie has probably done something wrong but Carmen’s mother must have some faults as well.

Carmen takes a really good care of her Grandmother. She writes several times that Scottie should install the burglar bars for her own safe. However, Scottie refuses to do that until right at the end of the story. Scottie promises to install the burglar bars right after Carmen has asked her about her mother. Maybe she is trying to draw Carmen’s attention to some other things instead of her mother. That can also be seen as a symbol of their relationship. In the beginning Scottie is Carmen’s trustworthy guardian but after Carmen’s mother’s visit, everything changes. Carmen starts to question her and Scottie approves Carmen’s insistence to install the burglar bars. Maybe that’s some kind of atonement.

All in all, I think that Full Stop is quite an interesting story even though it was really hard to read the text in some points because there was no punctuation. I also found the ending a little weird, the story just ends. Nevertheless, Full Stop is an impressive narration of the relationships between three women.