1. Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
« The bet » story analysis

2. Plot
• A banker and a young lawyer make a bet with each other based on capital
punishment and whether the death penalty is better or worse than life in
prison. The banker puts on the line two million dollars compared to the
lawyer’s life worth of fifteen years.
• For the next fifteen years the lawyer was placed in the lodge of banker’s
backyard without the knowledge of the outside world. The lawyer spends his
time in confinement reading books. In the meantime, the banker's fortune
declines and he realizes that he will be unable to pay off the bet, because he is
near bankruptcy from gambling. His only escape from his tragedy would be to
kill the lawyer. The day before the bet is up, the banker resolves to kill the
lawyer so as to not owe him the money. So when the banker opens the door of
lodge, he discovers the lawyer now looking like a skeleton. However, the
banker finds a note written by him and realizes that the lawyer plans to lose,
because the note declares that in his time in confinement the lawyer has
learned to hate material goods and understood that they are fleeting things.
Therefore, to prove his decision, he intends to leave confinement five hours
before when the bet would be up. He loses the bet unwittingly and saves his
own life.

3. • Exposition - Banker’s house, description of the party given fifteen
years ago. Guests discuss capital punishment.
 Conflict – Man vs. man
Man vs. Himself
• Complication – The lawyer and the banker make a bet, the lawyer’s
captive life begins, the banker loses much money because of
gambling.
• Climax – The banker comes to lodge to kill the lawyer.
• Falling action – The banker reads the lawyer’s note.
• Resolution – Next morning the lawyer escapes, the banker hides his
note.

4. Theme
Value of human’s life
Results of greed

5. Characterization
• The lawyer – (protagonist, round) The Lawyer grows throughout
the story. His character completely transforms from being an
arrogant, young man, in to an intelligent man. In the beginning he
is 25 years old young man who wants the two million rubles, but at
the end he hates anyone who thinks that meaning of life is just
getting money.
• The banker – (antagonist, flat) The banker, a spoiled and pampered
man, with very nervous and arrogant character. He has never
changed because he is unwilling to give up the material possession
with which he surrounds himself. He is so unwilling to change that
he is ready to kill the lawyer in order to keep what he has.
• Guests – (flat) took part in discussion.
• Watchmen – (flat) guard the lodge the lawyer stays.

6. Setting
• Place – Russia, the banker’s house, backyard
lodge
• Time – November 14, 1885
• Mood – 1)tense 2)desperate, sad.

7. • Irony – The lawyer stays fifteen years, but in the
end when he is so close to victory he refuses it.
• Symbols – The lawyer, the banker, the Gospel
• Point of view – Third person omniscient
• Foreshadowing – The banker loses money
gradually, gets close to bankruptcy each passing
day and it shows that he will devitate from giving
money.
• Flashback – The banker remembers the day they
bet and all following years.

8. Prepared by
Aytekin Aliyeva