Unit 3 Final Project
By : Teron Winters
Summary : Lamb to The Slaughter
At the beginning of the story Mary Maloney is waiting anxiously for her husband to get home she has everything already set up for him , once he finally gets home she asks him if he is hungry or not and he says no . He tells her that he needs to have a talk with her , he want's to get divorced. But Mary doesn't believe what she has heard so she goes downstairs to get some supper. What she had was a leg of lamb once she goes up he yells at her and says I don't want anything to eat! She hits him with the leg and he falls and dies. After she kills her husband she gets dressed and has a conversation with herself , talking as if she was a shop keeper. Once she gets home from the store she gets home and acts as if she had just now discovered the body of her dead husband. She quickly calls the FBI and acts as if she doesn't know what happens. Mr. Maloney was an officer so she would know the crime for killing one. Once the policemen get to her house they question her about the killing of her husband and she denies that she knows what happend. The officers talk about how whoever killed him it with a big weapon. The officers soon get tired of searching for the murder weapon and Mrs.Maloney asks them if they are hungry , it is late so they say yes. She cooks the leg of lamb that she killed Mr.Maloney with and that's what she feeds the officers. As they are eating the lamb the have a conversation about how the murder weapon is under their nose. Mary laughs when she hears that because of how ironic it was.
Comparison to The Tell Tale Heart
The Tell Tale Heart and Lamb to The Slaughter comparisons
> They both use irony Ex: Tell Tale Heart when the old man yells in terror the guy laughs as if it was funny and for Lamb to The Slaughter when the police officers are having a conversation about the murder weapon being right under their noses Mary starts laughing.
> Also both of the stories have examples of the main characters being psychopaths in a way.
> Both of the main characters were nice to the murdered people before they died.
> Both had policemen at the end of the story come in their homes.
Irony in Lamb to The Slaughter
One example of Irony in Lamb to the Slaughter is at the end of the story when the policemen are talking at the dinner table about the murder weapon. One of them says it could be right under our noses. And that made Mary Maloney laugh. This was ironic because it makes the reader think that she is being ironic by laughing at that because the murder weapon was the leg lamb that they were eating. This builds up suspense because you would like to know what happens after that. Does the police interrogate her?
Characterization
The characterization of Mary Maloney is that she is a stay at home wife , she lives to please her husband , she is pregnant , she is madly in love and the prefect wife. Then she becomes like a robot and gets the lamb and bangs it over her husbands head. For Patrick Maloney he is a police officer and he refuses his wife offer to make him dinner. And on Thursdays they eat out , he is behaving weird because he gulps down his first drink and gets another one. There is something that he has to tell his wife and he is drinking so he can tell her I think. He want's to leave her.
Lamb to the Slaughter (1979)