The Ironical Aspects in Li Rui's Electing a Thief
The Ironical Aspects in Li Rui’s Electing A Thief
“Electing a thief”, a short story written by Li Rui, is about a leader in the village who discovers the disappearance of a bag of grain from the storehouse and came up with the idea of “democracy” to get clues on finding the thief. (Li 321) The leader wants all the men from the village to vote for a thief but surprisingly, it turns out that the entire vote is unanimously against him. The head angrily quit his job and all the villagers are very excited about the joke they played on the captain but not for long, their heart suddenly filled with fear. “When they’d had their fill of laughter, some began to worry.” (Li 321) They recognize his significances to the village and now, being at a loss, they decide to go as a group to apologize for their imprudence. There is no doubt that the loss of a helpful leader is the irony of the story but this plot is the facade of the more in-depth irony that the author is trying to convey to the readers. In this paper, there are going to be discussions on the irony of the story and how Li Rui is trying to use this story to demonstrate the ironical aspects of the political system in China. Furthermore, there will be discussions on the symbolic and allegorical meaning of the story. These discussions will be further expanded to illustrate how the author uses his story to link to his view on democracy.
While this story seems straightforward, the irony happened in the middle of the story is rather shallow and fairly superficial. It begins after the villagers pissed off the head of the production team as they have collectively vote that he is the thief who stole the bag of grains. The team head got really angry about it and decides to leave the villagers and not to care a thing about them anymore. It is quite obvious that the villagers dislike the team head and they probably just want to teach him a lesson at first. Moreover, they also want to show him their feeling of suppress, but
“Electing a thief”, a short story written by Li Rui, is about a leader in the village who discovers the disappearance of a bag of grain from the storehouse and came up with the idea of “democracy” to get clues on finding the thief. (Li 321) The leader wants all the men from the village to vote for a thief but surprisingly, it turns out that the entire vote is unanimously against him. The head angrily quit his job and all the villagers are very excited about the joke they played on the captain but not for long, their heart suddenly filled with fear. “When they’d had their fill of laughter, some began to worry.” (Li 321) They recognize his significances to the village and now, being at a loss, they decide to go as a group to apologize for their imprudence. There is no doubt that the loss of a helpful leader is the irony of the story but this plot is the facade of the more in-depth irony that the author is trying to convey to the readers. In this paper, there are going to be discussions on the irony of the story and how Li Rui is trying to use this story to demonstrate the ironical aspects of the political system in China. Furthermore, there will be discussions on the symbolic and allegorical meaning of the story. These discussions will be further expanded to illustrate how the author uses his story to link to his view on democracy.
While this story seems straightforward, the irony happened in the middle of the story is rather shallow and fairly superficial. It begins after the villagers pissed off the head of the production team as they have collectively vote that he is the thief who stole the bag of grains. The team head got really angry about it and decides to leave the villagers and not to care a thing about them anymore. It is quite obvious that the villagers dislike the team head and they probably just want to teach him a lesson at first. Moreover, they also want to show him their feeling of suppress, but