爱华网The Million Pound Note
This time I want to talk about a very famous short story written by Mark Twain---------“The Million Pound Note”. Referring to Mark Twain, you must feel familiar, because we must have read his works before. I still remember the article “ The Bite Events on the Train” in our textbook when I’m in the middle school. What touched me most at that time were his ironic words. Yes, he is a great humorist, novelist, writer and orator in America in nineteenth century. During his 40 years’ writing career, he created dozens of short or long stories.
This story tells about a poor but honest American Adam Henry. When he was wandering in the street of London, he was given by two billionaires a letter, in which he surprisedly found a ￡1,000,000 pound bank-note. Later he got to know that the two billionaires who were brothers had made a bet about the results after he got a one million-pound note at once. One of them thought the note wound count for nothing to the poor man because he could not prove that the money was his own while the other considered just as the opposite.
Dramatically, the plot went just out of my expectation. Herry went to a restaurant to have dinner first. The manager was mean to him at the beginning but his attitude changed quickly when Herry took out the note and asked for change. Faced with a millionaire, the manager apologized again and again and obsequiously told Herry that he didn’t need to pay for the bill right now. So Herry managed to have a free dinner. Then similarly, Herry went to a clothing shop and got a suit of clothes costing him nothing.
Like the plot above, people are curious of such a rich man and tried every means to cozy up to him, from free food， free clothes to free accommodation. At the same time, his social status was becoming higher and higher and finally higher than most dukes. Apart from that, he later got a beautiful wife and 200,000 pounds of bank interest. I can imagine a bright future was waiting for him.
The writing style of this story is so humorous. Mark Twain used hyperbole describing how our hero defeated snobbishness repeatedly. What I appreciate most is the detailed description of different people’s ridiculous actions before one million pounds, vivid, funny, ironic and humorous, which forms a Caricature.
In terms of the theme, it is apparent that the author wanted to denounce the overflowing mammonism in the society. Even now it gives us an impressive lesson. Yes, I cannot deny the importance of money to a person who wants to survive. We won’t live without money, with
which we get food, clothes, house and many other necessities. But we must know that there are many things which can’t be bought with money such as love or friendship. So in my opinion, money may be important to us, but not the most important. We need to build up the correct sense of money.
To sum up, this story is a really good work of Mark Twain. The lesson I’ve learnt from it makes me want to be an honest man sincerely and lets me not to worship money too much. I begin to regret not reading it earlier.
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王珊红
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