Dillemma Essay Based on Short Storys

As defined by Merriam-Webster.com, a dilemma is stated as “a situation in which one has to choose between two or more equally unsatisfactory choices”.   Dilemmas often play a huge role in our lives and are even used by story writters to draw people into the story and to develop the plot and to round out a character. The two short stories Gentlemen, Your Verdict, and The Lady, or the Tiger have dillemmas which lead to characters making decisions, as dilemmas often tend to do, that leave readers questioning whether or not the decision in Gentlemen, Your Verdict was morally and ethically the right decision to make. Readers were also left with an indeterminate ending in The Lady, or the Tiger, where the decision to the dilemma is cut off due to the indeterminate ending.
Gentlemen, Your Verdict, and The Lady, or the Tiger, are based around dilemmas. Gentlemen, Your Verdict, is about a submarine with a crew of twenty one that hit an underwater mine and became stranded at the bottom of the ocean. The submarine only had enough oxygen for three days for a full crew and rescue was seven days away. The commanding officer, Lieutenant-Commander Oram, was forced to choose between having his crew sit tight and hope for the best or to kill fifteen of his men inculding himself so that at least a small portion of the survivors will have enough oxygen to wait until rescue. Oram choose the option that would ensure the lives of some of his crew would get out alive. In The Lady, or the Tiger, a princess and a commoner fall in love in a barbaric state not unlike Rome. The king dissaproves of this relationship and puts the princess' lover into an arena where he has to choose between two doors. one door hides a blood thirsty tiger and the other offers the lover a bride with whom he shall marry and spend the rest of his days with. The princess has to decide which option would bring her the least pain after finding out which door hides what and her lover asks her which door to choose but...