By Joshua Clein

SHORT STORIES PORTFOLIOS

This drawing of a string puppet perfectly symbolizes the story of “The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allan Poe. This drawing is representative

because the puppet is Fortunato. Fortunato is like the town drunk.

While drunk, he is stupid and easily controllable. He is like a puppet being controlled by Montresor. Montresor is a man who wants has a motive to kill

Fortunato, however it is never mentioned by Poe. Fortunato is led

down to the dungeon and is completely oblivious to the evil plans of Montresor. Also, Montresor’s plans

are like a puppet show, Fortunato being the puppet. His plan is planned out an d scripted, as is a puppet show.

THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO: PICTURE

In the rap song “John” by Lil Wayne, one of the lyrics

are “You fuck with me wrong, I knock your head

off your neck.” This sounds like what Montresor’s

motive is. Fortunato did something bad to him in

someway, and Montresor is attempting to exact his

revenge by trapping him in his vaults. Even though this reason is never mentioned by Poe, it is very obvious that Montresor has some

special reason to practically burry Fortunato alive behind a brick wall.

THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO: LYRIC

This drawing of an old fashioned scale can relate to the story of “The

Lady or the Tiger” by Frank R. Stockton quite well. The reason

being that the princess must “weigh” (ha ha ha) her options. She

must decide between letting the love of her life live and marry a

different women, or to let her love parish at the hands of a tiger so if

she cant have him, nobody can. Most people would think this was quite selfish. But really, is it? This

is the love of her life. Can you imagine how painful it would be if she would see him open that door

and that women jump into her loves arms and then them getting

married. It is a very tough decision. The scale gives readers more of a

visual.

THE LADY OR THE TIGER: PICTURE

The lyric “If I can't have you, I don't want nobody baby (nobody) If I can't

have you no, no (nobody else, nobody else) If I can't have you,

then I don't want nobody baby(haha)if I can't have you no, no…” from LFO’s song “If I Can’t

Have You.” Could not be more perfect for this story. In my opinion, I think the Princess led the man to the door with the tiger. This means

that she didn’t want anybody to have him but her. Logically meaning that if she couldn’t have him, then

nobody could. It is a classic example of a story when the protagonist has to make a split second decision that

effects the entire story. Therefor, this story fits the quote quite

properly.

THE LADY OR THE TIGER: LYRIC

The short story “The Most Dangerous Game” by Richard Connell is a story about a man

named Rainsford who goes over-board off of a ship and swims to

an abandoned looking island where he finds a nice man,

named General Zaroff, with a huge mansion. However, this man is deceivingly evil and

dangerous. Just like the platypus. The male platypus, though cute looking, is quite deadly. If it is angered, it will

strike its foe with its venomous spur on its leg. Just like the

Platypus, Zaroff is deceiving. He looks nice, but he is actually a cold blooded human-hunter.

THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME: PICTURE

General Zaroff doesn’t look scary, but he sure sounds and acts scary. He is out to kill humans for fun. He reminds me of the boogeyman. The boogeyman is a fictional figure who is said to hide in children’s closets and under their beds to scare and

possibly eat them. This reminds me of Zaroff, because he is waiting to find and kill Rainsford. In the song “Boogeyman” by Motorhead, there

is a lyric that says ‘’He's hiding inside your head. He's hiding

behind your eye. He be there until you die. Ridin' shotgun in your new

transam. Slide over for the boogeyman.’’ This is exactly like Zaroff in the way that he is on a

hunt.

THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME: LYRIC

The lottery is a story about a small village that has a

ceremony called a “lottery”. This is not like our lottery,

however. This is a lottery that involves death. The head of each family draw one slip of

paper out of a black box. What ever family has the paper with a black circle on it has to have

each person in that family draw fromt the box again. Whoever

gets that paper with a black dot get stoned to death. This

reminds me exactly of picking the shortest straw or stick, in the way that you ultimately

lose.

THE LOTTERY: PICTURE

When I think of the lottery, I think of one classic rhyme. “To bad, so sad”. Of course, when the rhyme is used, it

has some sarcasm in it. The so sad part is sarcastic

because when the person says it, they aren't actually sad For example, if I got an

A+ on a test and my friend go a C and he started

complaining to me, I would say “To bad, so sad”. This relates to “The Lottery”

because when Mrs. Hutchinson gets the death

card, she complains and says the drawing wasn’t fair. But

nobody cares. They still stone her to death. “To bad, so

sad.”

THE LOTTERY: RHYME

“Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” by Joyce

Carol Oates is a short story about a man named Arnold

Friend in his convertible car who attempts to seduce a 15 year-old girl named Connie. Eventually, he forces her to

come with him in his car to go have sex and then be killed. This intricute drawing of the

Angel of Death represents this story quite well. Reason being because, like death, Friend is persistent. He is persistent in raping Connie, and he knows its going to happen sooner or

later, like death to a living thing.

WHERE ARE YOU GOING, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?:

PICTURE

The lryic from the classic Christmas song about Santa Clause “he knows when you

are sleeping. He knows when you’re awake…” clearly

represents this story. It is exactly what Arnold Friend is

all about. At one point he literally says “I know

everything about you.” He then tells her all of this

person information about her, including where her parents currently are and

who her best friend is. If this story could have a theme

song, it would be this song.

WHERE ARE YOU GOING, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?:

LYRIC

This drawing of Brad Pitt from the movie “Twelve Monkeys”

represents this short story called “Orientation” by Daniel Orozco very well.

Reason being because Brad Pitt’s character in Twelve

Monkeys and the narrator of this story are similar in the way that they both start out

just sounding innocent. However, like Brad Pitt’s

character, things turn bad and evil sounding. The narrator begins talking about all the

psychotic people in the office and thigns get kind of dicey

ORIENTATION: PICTURE

In Justin Timberlake's new song “Cry Me a River”, there is one lyric that says “Cry me a river-

er. Cry me a river. Cry me a river-er, yea yea”. This matches the story of “Orientation” quite

well. It fits because the man giving us the tour tells us about all of these crazy people. But he

never says he feels sorry for them or anything. He just says

“Don’t talk to them…”. He doesn’t even care if they have

terrible misfortunes. The saying “cry me a river” means that the person who says it doesn’t care

about your sorrows because they have worse sorrows or

hardships. Basically saying “go ahead and cry a river because I

don’t care.”

ORIENTATION: LYRIC