Book Review ~~ Taste ~~

Today I read Taste, a short story by Roald Dahl. The story is about a betting game that two men have with each other; one, a stockbroker who is trying to become more cultured, bets the other, a gourmet, that the gourmet won’t be able to guess the wine the stockbroker has chosen. Though the gourmet knows a wide variety of wines, Mike, the stockbroker, doesn’t mind, happy that the wines he chooses are popular enough to be recognized by the relatively famous gourmet, Richard Pratt. One day, he chooses an extremely rare wine, but even though he warns Pratt of the fact, Pratt wants to bet, not a small sum of money, as would be reasonable, but two country houses! At first, I found this decision to be highly peculiar, but as events progressed, I realized that he had a very good reason for doing so. I enjoyed the story very much, as it introduced many twists I hadn’t expected. I found it to be quite intriguing, with a relatively simple explanation revealed by an unlikely person. The author described the story very well, using a lot of detail, and I could almost imagine the story. I would rate it 9.6/10 and recommend it to anyone who likes short stories, mysteries, or other books by Roald Dahl.

Book Review ~~ The Bet ~~

Recently, I read the short story “The Bet,” by Anton Chekhov. I found it a very interesting story about a bet between a lawyer and a banker who are arguing about life imprisonment and the death sentence. The lawyer, who would prefer life imprisonment to the death sentence, because at least the imprisoned does not die, agrees to spend fifteen years trapped in a small cabin located in the banker’s garden. The banker, a reckless young millionaire, agrees to pay him two million dollars if he can do so successfully, since he believes that life imprisonment is merely a slow form of death. When the lawyer comes out greatly changed, the author shows that life imprisonment is, truly, worse than death — the lawyer no longer cares for the two million dollars he staked fifteen years of his life on, and a large majority of his opinions about the world were completely changed during his fifteen years of study. I found the storyline, as well as the message behind the story, engaging because of the large stakes in the story. I would rate it 9.8/10 and recommend it to anyone interested in the debate between the death sentence and life imprisonment or simply looking for an interesting book to read.

Book Review ~~ Pygmalion ~~

Recently I read the book “Pygmalion.” I found it a very good story, with some of the same themes as to “A Doll’s House,” as well as being set in the same time period and place. It’s about a bet that a master of English accents makes with his friend, that he can take a simple flower-girl off the streets and pass her off as a duchess in six months, but the results are so much more complicated. The main character becomes a fairly good duchess, and the two take good care of her as they teach her how to act like a duchess. The problem is that they never thought about what they would do with her afterwards. She only wanted to work as a flower-girl in a more prestigious shop, but they made her into someone who could be a duchess and never thought of the differences between the girl from the slums, who Eliza was when she went to them, and the almost-duchess, who they had made Eliza. Then, they tried to return Eliza to her old life without realizing that the ‘new Eliza’ wasn’t accustomed to that life. I would recommend it to anyone who liked “The Doll House” or anyone who wants to read about the changes that Eliza underwent and rate it a 9.3/10.

*I’ve also written a convoluted, alternative epilogue. If anyone wants to read it, please comment and I’ll edit it in.*