A Conflict Issue in The Open Boat Novel

In the pieces of literature that we read during the semester, there was a theme that was in common. The characters have some type of problem that interferes with their journey. The characters need to adapt to the situation to continue their journey. Some of the problems are life threatening and some are not. There were many different types of conflicts. All of the characters had to overcome some type of conflict.

In the short story “The Open Boat” the characters find them self in a life threatening problem.

The type of conflict that they are facing is a self vs. nature conflict. They are on a little boat in the sea and are trying to get to shore. They were trying to get to shore because there was a storm coming. As they were trying to get to shore the waves were getting stronger and this was creating a problem for them. This was the central conflict that the characters were having.

Get quality help now

Dr. Karlyna PhD

Verified writer

Proficient in: Free Essays

4.7 (235)

“ Amazing writer! I am really satisfied with her work. An excellent price as well. ”

+84 relevant experts are online

Hire writer

They had to overcome this problem if they wanted to live. Some of the people were able to and some were not. To sum up, the characters needed to overcome some of their problems so that they could survive.

In the short story “Paul’s Case” the main character, Paul, finds himself in a dilemma. Paul is a kid that gets into a lot of trouble. He gets into trouble at school and at home. Paul starts to become depressed from his life. He then decides to steal money from his dad and to go to New York.

He stays there for a few days and he finds out that his dad is coming for him. He decides that he wants to kill himself. He goes to the train tracks and jumps in front of a train that is coming. Him wanting to kill himself is the central conflict. This is a self vs. self-conflict. This is the major conflict that he has in his life.

In the book The Odyssey the main character Odysseus gets into many problems. The central conflict is that Odysseus can’t find his way back home. It takes him ten years to get back home to his wife and son. The type of conflict that he has is a self vs. supernatural conflict. To conclude, Odysseus has many conflicts in his life and many of them were life threatening.

These three pieces of literature all have one thing in common, they all have a central conflict. The central conflict in each story is different in all of them the conflict is life threatening. The characters need to overcome these challenges in order to survive. The whole story revolves around the central conflict. To sum up, all of the stories have one thing in common which is that they all have a central conflict.