Wsetlord wrote:Hi, I'm reading the complete works of H.P. Lovecraft on my Kindle Touch and I'm really loving it! I liked this story, it's about revenge for an uncalled damage, like the Cats of Ulthar. I just have a question, with so much time that they all had, why nobody came out with the idea of cutting the rope? I mean, it's a simple lifesaver rope, not a chain. Really, in such a predicament, if one cannot let go of something holding you, you try to break it, right? There were acquaintances of the people holding the rope, and so many other expectators... I know that it says that they just abandoned them, but none even tried. Perhaps it was impossible to cut, due to the same mysterious force holding the men to it, but it could have been an interesting adition to say that they at least gave it a try.
They could have gone the "127 hours way", messy, but preferable to dying...
You really got me thinking about this, just as I was signing outa here!
It's a really good point you raise, but I don't think it's a criticism of the story as much as an interesting and probably intending point of discussion.
Think of it this way: whenever you get locked into one of those tug-of-war, me-vs.-them relationships... what's usually the strongest response you seem to have? Cut the tie completely and simply walk away from it all? Or pull and pull, debate the point, go to war, WIN. Put your back into it, get morepeople on your side to pull.
I think I missed all of this the first time I heard this story last year (because, well, SEA MONSTERS!) and now I see the cool analogy as something pretty obvious. The harder you PULL the harder it is to see that you can just
cut the rope. From boyfriends to political beliefs to oversea wars, we tend to get dragged in and supposedly "can't let go." Even the people watching from the beach get so wrapped up in the back-and-forth that they can't seem to see that the obvious solution might be to
just cut the rope.
Not trying to start a flaming political discussion here, I think we're all guilty of this to some degree, on a personal and social level. Regardless of right or wrong choice you can always cut the rope, calm yourself, think and regroup.
...then go back and catch that weird freaking sea-horror in a more efficient, practical and healthy way, dummy.