Atmosphere Described, of the Characters

¶ … atmosphere described, of the characters in each story and of the final denouement, both of the stories are quite similar in terms of the big 'why' question that seems to be posed throughout them. The readers cannot help but wonder at the motivation of why the children are tearing down and destructing Old Misery's house from the inside, as they cannot wonder what the connection is between the boy's death and his almost supernatural power of seeing horse winners.

Graham Greene's story, despite being a sad story, with Old Misery losing his house, it does not bear the tragic traits that D.H Lawrence's story has. It is true that the priciest and most important possession of Old Misery, his house, is destroyed from the inside, but this still has the main characteristics of a teenage prank and the reader is bent to see a positive conclusion even after the story ends: the parents of the teenagers might gather the money to compensate the old man for this loss, the entire town might do this, etc.

At the same time, despite the absurd of the entire situation, one cannot feel a certain admiration, both for the way in which the teenagers manage to pull of the entire action, but also for the organization, planning and coordination that makes its way in their group. This is not an act that is just done, it is thoroughly organized, everything knows what they need to do and the overall leader, T. For this projects, assigns everybody with chores to complete.

D.H. Lawrence's story, on the other hand, has a very tragic finality. Despite his gifts, including his imagination, the boy dies and there is nothing that one can see beyond this ending. While the life in Greene's town will continue more or less on the same note in the future, life in Lawrence's framework has finalized in a very complete and tragic way. From this point-of-view, there is however a similitude with Greene's story from the perspective of the absurd that is encountered in each of the stories.

In Greene's story, the absurd seems to derive from the lack of a true motivation for the teenagers' actions: knocking down a house must have some sort of explanation in general. Old Misery, for example, is someone for whom this absurd is truly being manifested: he is missing his house all of a sudden. On the other hand, in Lawrence's story, the absurd comes not only from the action of the story, but from its conclusion: death in itself is an absurd act, an act against which humans cannot find any explanation, similar from this perspective to the lack of explanation for the teenagers' actions.

The story that Lawrence writes bears the entire existentialist anguish of the 20th century. The boy needs a parallel and imaginary universe, with the horse as its centerpiece, on which to base his existence, mainly because of an attempt to avoid and evade his own existence. This is where his imagination meets his remarkable gift for choosing horses at the race track.

On the other hand, in Greene's story, the existentialist anguish that the teenagers might be themselves starting to experiment, does not reflect a tragic perspective, but more of a phase of life that everybody has to pass through (which is why Old Misery's remark that he was a boy once as well is important). The prank, despite being conceived with a master plan, is still just a teenager prank.

It is interesting to note, and this is something unique to Greene's story, the way in which the relationships within the group develop. Although not intentional, Blackie's authority over the group is questioned by T's presence. T brings something new to the group: imagination (a common theme between the two stories), which means that he promotes a challenging way of thinking which will diversify the activities of the group as well, something very important at an age where you tend to get bored quite fast.

On the other hand, just as in any group, the moment that T's newly discovered authority is questioned, his whole persona becomes doubtful, whether he would be able to continue to survive in the group or not. Blackie's attitude and his own regained leadership helps Trevor stay on track with his project in the group, but it is interesting to note how the adolescent cruelty might have immediately exploded at that point within the group.