Compare And Contrast Essay (Monkey's Paw And The Third Wish)

Compare And Contrast Essay

“The Third Wish” a by Joan Aiken and “The Monkey’s Paw” by W. W. Jacobs are short stories based on a man that can ask for three wishes. “The Third Wish” is a modern day fables, meanwhile the second one is a horror story. Both stories have differences and similarities that can lead to a great ending.

In the first story, Mr. Peters saves a swan that was trapped in thorns growing on the bank of a canal, after he assured everything was right with the swan he was leaving, but he turned around and saw a little man with green clothes, a golden crown and long beard, he was astonished. The green man started to thank the man for saving him; the magical creature offered him a reward for his action. “I expect three wishes, no more and no less”, the green man criticized how humans never used the wishes with intelligence, but accepted the offer. Meanwhile in the Monkeys Paw, Mr. White has curiosity about what Sergeant-major Morris had, “I should like to see those old temples and fakirs and jugglers”, even thought Morris didn’t wanted to show them the Monkey’s Paw, each member of the family had curiosity so he couldn’t avoid showing it to them. He explained the family that it would grant three wishes to three men, the first one’s last wish was to die, the second man was him, Morris, and he wouldn’t talk about it, he told the to be careful.

Both main characters made acceptable first wishes, but Mr. Peters, rom the first book is the one who thought more about his wish “I wish I had a wife as beautiful as the forest”, he asked for this because he felt lonely. After waiting a little he saw how a beautiful woman approached him and after some questions he discovered she was his wife and after some days they got married. Meanwhile Mr. White from “The Monkey’s Paw” is the one who was thinking about his first wish in a way he didn’t cared that much, because he knew that everything he wanted was near him, his family, but he had curiosity, “I wished for two hundred pounds.” that was his first wish and he was expecting an instantly reward, but it didn’t come till the next day. He received a check marking two hundred pounds; it was remuneration for his son’s death.

After the second wished they both made, both of them had different endings. Mr. Peters noticed through the entire story that his wife wasn’t happy, she did everything a wife had to do, but she simply was not happy. He tried to do everything to animate her, but it was useless, because he discovered that the king, the one who granted the three wishes, had transformed a swan into a beautiful woman to make her his wife. His second wish was to transform her again into a swan even thought she didn’t liked the idea, but at the same time she was grateful. “Mr. Peters was found peacefully dead… In between his hands,… were a withered leaf and a white feather.”

...