What is the main theme of the story The Bet?

The story, “The Bet”, is about a banker and a young lawyer who lay a bet with each other based on capital punishment and life imprisonment and whether the former is better than the latter. The story essentially deals with man’s progressive understanding of the useful precepts of life.

What happens at the end of The Bet?

At the end of Anton Chekhov’s “The Bet”, the lawyer survives the 15 years in prison but refuses to take the money.

What is the moral of the story The Bet by Anton Chekhov?

The moral of Anton Chekhov’s “The Bet” is that materialism and material wealth ultimately means nothing.

What is ironic about the ending of The Bet?

The concluding example of irony in the story is when the banker actually experience freedom because of the information and intelligence he has gained by being able to read books and travel places with his mind, and the banker feels trapped because of the two million dollars he has to pay the lawyer.

What is the conflict of The Bet?

One of the conflicts is the bet that the lawyer and the banker made to prove that imprisonment for life is a better punishment than death. This conflict is external conflict, man versus man. The other conflict in this story is the conflict inside the lawyer when he is in jail for fifteen years.

What do the banker and the lawyer learn from the story the bet?

In Chekhov’s “The Bet,” the banker and the lawyer both learn the futility of their wager, as they have found that life and its conditions differ greatly from their more youthful perceptions. The lawyer learns that his sweeping statement that life on any terms is better than death is not true.

What is the climax of The Bet?

The climax of the short story, or the main turning event, is when the banker starts to see that the young man would win the bet, so he decides it to kill the man, but when he is about to do it, he finds a letter the young man had wrote saying that he will not accept the money the banker was supposed to give him.

Why did the lawyer give up the money in The Bet?

Answers 1. The lawyer renounced the bet because during his time in is prison he realized that the money would not afford him true freedom….the money wouldjust become another kind of prison. He didn’twant the money, and he had no desire to become a prisoner of society.

What is the symbolism behind the two million in the bet?

This short story portrays a situation in which the banker and lawyer wages a bet based on the idea of the death penalty and life imprisonment. The banker puts on the line two million dollars compared to the lawyer’s life worth of fifteen years.

Who is the antagonist of the bet and why?

The Banker After all, whatever happens to the lawyer, at least he is doing it to himself and doesn’t seem to be affecting others in the process. On the other hand, the banker is ready to actually kill the lawyer in order to hang on to his money.

How did the lawyer win the bet?

On the face of it, the banker wins the bet, because the lawyer leaves his cell five minutes before midnight—the time of his release—thereby violating the terms of the bet. In doing so, the lawyer lets go of the two million that would have been given to him had he stayed in his cell until the very last minute.

Why did the banker think of murdering the lawyer?

The banker is repulsed by his own earlier motives to murder the lawyer in order to save himself from financial ruin. Now, he feels “a great contempt for himself” for what the lawyer has endured and for his own overriding avarice.

What type of conflict is in the story the bet?

In the short story “The Bet” by Anton Chekhov; the lawyer encounters many types of conflicts including man vs. man, man vs. self, and man vs. nature.

Why did the banker regret making the bet?

Answer: The banker regretted his action in the end of the period of agreement because he was not able to manage two million. In order to save himself from bankruptcy, he went into the cell to kill the prisoner where he came to know that the lawyer was not interested in money. This disclosure made him regret his action.