The Secret History Analysis

PLOT OF THE SECRET HISTORY The Secret History took place in Hampden, Vermont (New England), and was likely happened in the nineteenth century for the way the characters had dressed and the story was told in the first person point of view. The time the story had taken was maybe one of the reasons why the story became more interesting. If the story were to be happened in 21st century the way the events happened will be different, the characters might end up being prisoned for the reason that their actions were caught by camera perhaps. The story was taken place at the right century, it made every character act more suspicious and things more complicated. The story started with Richard Papen, the narrator of the story who reflects on his college
Richard still wanted to take classics and told the professor that he will talk with the Greek lit professor in order to be able to take the class. The name of the Greek Literature professor is Julian Morrow. He was a wealthy man and has taught for many years but refuses payment for his work, he is brilliant and quite peculiar. Richard tried to talk to the professor but the professor refuses him to be in his class. He then became more interested in the professors class and met the only five classics students of Morrow. He met Bunny Corcoran, Charles and Camilla Macaulay, Francis Abernathy, and Henry Winter. Fortunately, he was able to take the class after helping the group to solve a Greek grammar problem. After being part of the class Richard became more aware of how the class flows and began to be interested to be part of the group. They have shared a lot of memories together as time goes by, they hang up in Francis’s country house, an idyllic rural setting where the friends drink, debate and play croquet and became close to each other. But still, Richard felt like he was not part of the group, there were times where the group was hiding something for him. In the winter break, Richard decided to stay at Hampden
tall, wears spectacles, dark-haired, with a square jaw and coarse, pale skin. He is very intelligent, knew up to seven or eight languages and can read hieroglyphics. He was excellent in everything he does including repairing of watches like a jeweler, can grow flowers, and even manages to do better job in bandaging a cut finger. When he was young, he had a bad accident, got hit by a car and nearly dead. He was out of school for a couple of years, had tutors but prefer to lie in bed and read. The accident almost made him lost his eye and a sort of limp. He got interested and curious in one of their topics in classics which is the Bakcheia or the Dionysian Frenzy, an ancient, wild ritual designed to release people from the 'burden of the self'. Henry, Bunny, Francis, Charles and Camilla did everything to succeed in doing the ritual; they wore chitons (a form of clothing in Ancient Greek worn by both man and women) made from bed sheet, drink, tried drugs, prayer, sing Greek hymns which made Bunny find humorous, and even small doses of poison. Their first attempt didn’t succeed so they decided to try fasting. Bunny didn’t cooperate very well and was caught by Charles eating when he supposedly fasting; they decided to slip away and do the ritual without him. They succeeded; they actually saw Dionysus (the god of grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness, fertility, theatre and religious ecstasy in ancient Greek