Compare and Contrast Lamb to the Slaughter and The Speckled Band Essay

Compare and Contrast Lamb to the Slaughter and The Speckled Band ‘Lamb to the Slaughter’ and ‘The Speckled Band’ are both written is separate eras and cultures, and these differences are reflected in the way the authors use language, structure and moral techniques in their stories. How ever, there are some similarities in these stories as both are of the thriller genre. The story ‘Lamb to the Slaughter’ is about a husband and a wife whose relationship comes to a sudden halt. The sweet innocent wife Mary Maloney kills Mr. Maloney due to that he wants to divorce her. Mary becomes very shocked and confused and kills Mr. Mahoney with a Leg of Lamb. Mary produces an act to hide herself from the murder. The police do not realise this and she gets away. The story ‘The Speckled Band’ is not very different to ‘Lamb to the Slaughter’ but it has some differences. The story is about a Detective who finds himself and his partner trying to work out a case of murder. Dr. Roylott is the person who is suspected of being the guilty one but in the end he gets killed himself. ‘The Speckled Band’ is set in Victorian England. This was a time when England was a terrible place to live. Crime was high in the slums of London but when the Sherlock Holmes stories began to appear attitude started to change. Sherlock Holmes became the perfect detective as he cracked every case and always defeated evil. The setting of the stories reinforces 19th Century morality. The murder it self is set in an old mansion in the countryside â€Å"A picture of ruin†. ‘Lamb to the Slaughter’ however is portrayed as being set in modern Ireland in an ordinary house with an ordinary couple. The names of the couple help us to predict where the couple ar... ...s. The second plot twist is at the end, where the detectives eat the murder weapon. This is all due to these language techniques. ===================================================================== The moral message in ‘The Speckled Band’ is of an old 19th Century storyline ‘Good always wins over evil’. In contrast to ‘Lambs to the Slaughter’ the moral message is very different. ‘Lambs to the Slaughter’ however uses a Modern Moral code. ‘Crime does pay’ in ‘Lambs to the Slaughter’. However. It is clear that ‘The Speckled Band reinforces 19th Century morality ‘crime doesn’t pay’. ====================================================================== In comparison the stories use very different language techniques, moral code and settings. This helps the stories have different storylines and endings due to them being written in very different times.