The Bet Summary How It All Goes Down Fifteen years ago, a banker threw a shindig in which he bet a younglawyer two million rubles that the lawyer couldn't stay in solitary confinement for five years. The lawyer raised the stakes to fifteen years, and holed up in a guesthouse on the banker's estate. He's had no contact with any humans during this time, but has been able to read all the books he could want. The lawyer's reading has ranged from novels to philosophy and languages to religious texts to a confusing mishmash. What can we say The dude has had some time on his hands. !ow, the fifteen years is almost up and the banker is worried that if he h as to pay the two million large, he'll be bankrupt. "olution He opts to ice the l awyer. "o he sneaks up on the lawyer, who's fast asleep. #ust as he is about to kill the dude, the banker finds a note that explains that through his reading the lawyer has come to totally re$ect the material world. %t turns out he's planning on throwing the bet on purpose by leaving five hours early. The banker kisses the lawyer's head, cries, and leaves. The next day, the guards report that the lawyer bailed early. The banker takes the letter and puts it into his safe
The Bet Summary •
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& rich rich banker is remembering a party he hosted hosted fifteen years ago where a debate broke out about whether capital punishment or life imprisonment is the more moral punishment. The banker argued that life in prison is $ust a very slow death, so it would be better to get the death penalty and get it over with. & young young lawyer argued the oppositethat any any life is better than death, even if it means rotting in prison for decades. (h oh. %t's a stalemate. "o the two made a betif the lawyer can stand to be in voluntary solitary confinement for fifteen years, the banker will pay him two million smackers. !ow that's a lot of dough. The banker set him up in a guesthousethe lawyer could get food, books, music, whatever he wanted except human communication of any sort. &t first, the lawyer seemed seemed depressed, but soon began studying studying vigorously, because you know, no !etflix in )*th+century ussia. First, he tackles languages and a bunch of things written in them. Then, the -ible. Then, a cray mix of science, literature, and other seemingly random things. "oon, the fifteen years is almost up, because there's no better wa y to pass the time than reading a bunch of obscure books, right, /h0s
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%n the present, the banker realies that if the lawyer wins, he won't be able to pay up the two million. He's lost his banking fortune, and if he has to shell out, he'll be totally bankrupt forever. The only thing to do 1ill the lawyer before the fifteen years ends. 2n the last night of the prison term, the banker sneaks in to the guesthouse. The guards aren't there so he has no trouble slipping in. The lawyer is sleeping, and $ust as the banker is about to finish him off, he sees that there is a note on the desk. The note says that the lawyer has spent his fifteen years experiencing all that life has to offer through books. His conclusion The material world is stupid and worthless because we're all boun d to croak in the end anyways. To prove how much he re$ects it, he puts his money where his mouth is. -y which we mean the lawyer rejects the money altogether. He promises to leave the cell five hours earl y to forfeit any claim to the coin.
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The banker kisses the lawyer's head and leaves. /hew, he doesn't have to murder the guy.
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The next day, the guesthouse guard reports that the lawyersneaked out five hours early.
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The banker takes the note forfeiting the money and locks it in a safe.
The -et Theme of Wisdom and 1nowledge The final twist in 3The -et3 hinges on the idea that the lawyer took all the knowledge he could get from the many, many books he read in the prison, and turned it into wisdom. %n other words, he claims that the second+hand info he gets from reading is pretty much the same thing as lived experience, so he's been there, done all of that. -ut he's not done. He a lso relies on this version of experience to decide that4 experience kind of sucks. W hat hangs in the balance of this weird transformation is whether the reader buys itwhich means we've $ust met a modern+day asceticor doesn'twhich means that solitary confinement has robbed this sad man of his humanity. %t's up to you, "hmoopers.
Questions About Wisdom and Knowledge ).
0o you think the lawyer actually understands the books he's reading %s it possible to fully get what someone else is describing if you don't have any life experience to connect it to %n the last two years thelawyer reads a little bit of everything. Why is this %s he double+checking that his religious conclusions are correct 2r is he $ust trying to get as much experience as possible
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The only way anyone knows anything about what the lawyer is going through is by trying to interpret his movements through the little prison cell window. How much can we trust these
interpretations 0o we know anything about the lawyer's mindset before reading his letter W hy does the story make him such a mystery 6.
2ne of the lawyer's arguments for how other people have lost sight of what's important is to say that they 3would marvel if, owing to strange events of some sorts, frogs and liards suddenly grew on apple and orange trees instead of fruit3 75.)89. -ut isn't it totally le git to find a sudden random change like that fascinating What does the lawyer mean
Chew on This Try on an opinion or two, start a debate, or play the devil’s advocate. The mad scramble for random books in the last years of his confinement shows that the lawyer is trying to find a way to hang on to some part of the material world before totally giving himself over to his newfound belief system. The main point of the story is that knowledge cannot be separated from experience, and that the world cannot be understood by someone not actually living in it.
The -et Theme of :ife, ;onsciousness, and
Questions About Life, Consciousness, and Existence ).
What's going to happen to the lawyer after the story ends %s he going to kill himself, or $ust go all -oo adley on us How do you know
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What do you think about the banker's =uestionwhich is better, to be killed all at once by the executioner or to slowly rot away in $ail 0o different answers to this =uestion say something a bout the personality or character of the person answering
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0oes the experiment of the bet prove anything about the death penalty vs. life imprisonment argument from the party Why or why not
Chew on This Try on an opinion or two, start a debate, or play the devil’s advocate. The story ends up showing that the =uest for knowledge has a damaging effect on living life.
The story ends up showing that the only way to get to the true essence of life is to toss out every other aspect of existence. The tragedy is that this is obviously a totally unworkable route for most.
The -et Theme of "acrifice &s soon as one of the party people argues that a government that can'trestore human life shouldn't have the right to take it away, well, we know that the theme of sacrifice is going to be important in 3The -et.3"acrifice turns out to be the most plausible way for the banker to view the actions of the lawyerand for the lawyer himself to describe his own reaction to his voluntary imprisonment. He agrees to throw a part of his life away, to sacrifice his connection to the rest of humanity in order to find some other level of existence. -ut the story refuses to answer the obvious =uestiondoes he succeed
Questions About Sacrice ).
Why do you think the lawyer takes the bet What do you think this says about this life Why does he raise the term from five years to fifteen without asking for more money from the banker
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0oes it make sense that the government should only be able to take away what it can give back Would this apply to putting people in prisonafter all, the government wouldn't be a ble to give someone that lost time back 7as those who are exonerated after wrongful convictions know all too well9
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The lawyer claims to re$ect the world and everything it has to offer. -ut in order for it to be a sacrifice, doesn't he have to have those things first before giving them up %s he really giving anything up 2r has he $ust gotten so used to his imprisonment that he wants to hang on to what he knows
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Why does the banker feel contempt for himself after reading the letter %s he moved by the idea of a big sacrifice or $ust relieved that thesacrifice won't have to be his
Chew on This Try on an opinion or two, start a debate, or play the devil’s advocate. The only person who is truly facing a great sacrifice in the story is the banker, for whom the two million large has come to mean the difference between being successful and being a complete failure. The lawyer's final re$ection of the world is totally of a piece with his adding an extra ten years to his sentence, and both sacrifices mark him as a new kind of spiritual hermit
The -et Theme of %solation 3The -et3 might not actually have anything to say about the death penalty, but it can certainly be read as an experiment in soli tary confinement. "ure, most prisoners are fairly deprived, but how can
you figure out the effects of total isolation, rather than plain old confinement Here, a prisoner has all the physical and intellectual comforts that he could want, but he's cut off from any and all human contact. What follows is the psychological transformation of an already slightly unbalanced man into a being that loses all touch with his own humanity. ?ikes.
Questions About solation ).
What does the lawyer mean when he says 3desires are the worst foes of the prisoner3 7).)@9 What's wrong with having desires, hopes, and dreams in confinement
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The banker spies on the prisoner through the little window. The lawyer asks for the guns to be fired if his multilingual note is correct. 0o either of these things break the rules of the isolation bet Why or why not
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0oes the lawyer feel like he is isolated, or do the books seem to give him some sort of companionship Whom is he arguing with when he is seen to be arguing with himself in his little room
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What effect does the isolation have on the lawyer 2n the banker
Chew on This Try on an opinion or two, start a debate, or play the devil’s advocate. The story shows that isolation is the one surefire way to get someone to shed most of their humanity. True isolationno bookswould have actually been better for the lawyer in the long run. He would have missed and sought out human companionship instead of $ust re$ecting the world outright. "ee -ooks are bad news.
The -et Theme of ;ompetition -y setting the action up as a bet, this story necessarily ends up being a contest between the two men involved. The one+upmanship is the reason for the bet, the reason for the raised confinement length ante, the reason for the banker almost committing murder, and maybe even the reason for the lawyer's final twist of an escape. %n the end, though, 3The -et3 refuses to in any way rule on the wager at its center, leaving the reader to decide whether anyone won or lost, and whether the competition between the banker and the lawyer was the strongest motivator for the actions of each.
Questions About Com!etition ).
Why does the banker fear being pitied by the lawyer 0o the bankerand the lawyer respect each other How do you know
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0oes anyone win this bet 0oes anyone lose What would a win constitute %s there a difference between winning the money and winning the bet
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Wouldn't it have been better for the lawyer to stick around and take the money &fter all, he didn't know the banker wanted to kill him. Why not take it and give it to charity, for example, even if he doesn't want to keep it himself
Chew on This Try on an opinion or two, start a debate, or play the devil’s advocate. The story's ending is an elegant solution in which both men emerge from the bet victorious. The entire competitive aspect of the story is purely in the banker's mindthe lawyer couldn't care less about the banker and has no interest in any of the $ockeying for position that the banker seems to be obsessed with
The -anker Character Analysis The host of the party where the death penalty vs. life imprisonment debate happens, the banker bets the lawyer two million dollars to stay in solitary confinement for fifteen years. Aaybe it's $ust us, but it seems pretty clear that any story about two people making some kind of complicated and cray bet would be at least somewhat about a power struggle between them. Haven't we all seen She's All That How else could you get a nice bit of dramatic action going if not for some competition, right 2nly in this case, it's all about a moral debate, rather than achael :eigh ;ook. Hey, close enough. "ure enough, as soon as the banker and the lawyer are introduced they seem ready to claw each other's faces off. 0oesn't it kind of make you wonder wh y on earth the banker would have invited someone over that he hates so much %t might well be spite that makes the lawyer up the bet to fifteen years 7against himself, no less9. &nd it's probably also spite that makes the banker not $ust get 3delighted3 at the 3senseless bet3 but also 3make fun of the young man3 as the party goes on 7).))9. "o if the whole thing is a power struggle between the two of them, what can we make of what the banker represents
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First, let's take a look at his personality. We don't have a ton of insight into it, but there are a few pretty giant honking clues that he's not the nicest guy in town. !o, he's the kind of guy who would let the person he is betting agai nst raise his own stakes 7from five years to fifteen years9 without anteing up any extra dough. He is also the kind of guy who would mock someone that he plans on locking up $ust to prove a pointand the kind of guy who would take a hypothetical argument and immediately turn it into a demand for physical proof. -asically, he likes to be in a position of authority and likes to wield power over others, especially those who happen to disagree with him.
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"econd, let's check out his more symbolic appearance in the story. We'll shift from thinking about the banker as a person, and instead try to see him as a category.
The :awyer Character Analysis A yo"n! !"est at the party, the lawyer bets that he can spend fifteen years in vol"ntary solitary confinement to prove that any kind of life is better than death. %f the banker is on the side of government, surveillance, and generally has The Aan+like characteristics, then what do we make of the la wyer There's basically two ways to go with this one. &nd honestly "hmoop's not a psychologist, and we don't even play one on ?ouTube, but how you feel about the lawyer probably says more ab out you than about him. Why, you ask Well, it's actually intentionally woven into the story itself. &fter all, we have virtually ero access to the lawyer's thoughts, feelings, or ideas, so everything we can figure out about him has to come from $ust imposing our own interpretations on his somewhat mysterious and confusing actions. 2kay, maybe we do play shrinks on ?ouTube.
%!tion &'( Wise "u# )ermit %nterpretation number one takes this mystery and confusion and runs with it. %n this version of what's up with the lawyer, he is basically a modern+day -iblical cave hermit. ?ou know that generic cartoon wise old man that sits up on a secluded mountain and you have to climb and climb and climb to ask him some deep =uestion, to which he says, yo" tell me That's what we're talking about herea guy who voluntarily takes himself out of the world to really get some time to think about things. &fter all, when the banker proposes his cray bet, the lawyer $umps on that thing like it's the last rowboat off the TitanicD 3'%f you mean that in earnest,' said the young man, '%'ll take the bet, but % would stay not five but fifteen years'3 7).E9. What W ho in a million years would take that bet &nd who on earth would take it and then increase the difficulty for himself 2nly someone who already has monastic or ascetic tendencies, we say. &nd of course, a craed, deeply spiritual hermit is exactly what the lawyer turns into. ;heck out his conclusions about life at the end of his letter to the bankerD #$ despise wisdom and the blessin!s of this world. $t is all worthless, fleetin!, ill"sory, and deceptive, like a mira!e. %& $ marvel at yo" who e(chan!e heaven for earth. $ don't want to "nderstand yo".# 75.)+)89 He doesn't $ust re$ect the moneyhe re$ects all of human life. 0ude's got people problems4
%!tion &*( )e+s "one +ound the -end 4 Which takes us straight into interpretation number twodude's straight up cray. %f we examine the evidence again, we get a totally different sense of what the lawyer's driving motivation might actually be. What kind of person would sign up for a fifteen+year term of total isolation Aaybe not the most mentally balanced kind. -ut the kicker for this second theory is the lawyer's assertion that by reading a lot of books he's experienced everything that a man ever couldD #)or fifteen years $ have been intently st"dyin! earthly life. $t is tr"e $ have not seen the earth nor men, b"t in yo"r books $ have dr"nk fra!rant wine, $ have s"n! son!s, $ have h"nted sta!s and wild boars in the forests, have loved women. . . . *ea"ties as ethereal as clo"ds, created by the ma!ic of yo"r poets and !eni"ses, have visited me at ni!ht, and have whispered in my ears wonderf"l tales that have set my brain in a whirl. %& $n yo"r books $ have fl"n! myself into the bottomless pit, performed miracles, slain, b"rned towns, preached new reli!ions, con+"ered whole kin!doms. . . . # 75.)>9 We hate to break to you, dude, but you have done no such thing. ?ou havemaybegotten a vicarious glimpse of what those things mi!ht be like. -ut this conviction that reading about something e=uals living it ?eah, get this man to a doctor, stat.
The -et Tone Take a story's temperatre by stdyin! its tone. Is it hope"l# Cynical# $narky# %lay"l#
$atter of .act, %b/ecti0e, 1r#, 2nemotional "ay you're writing a piece of fiction in which a guy decides to seal himself up in solitary confinement for fifteen years. What's the first thing you imagine you'll need to do %f you're like "hmoop, you immediately start wracking your brains to try to figure out how on earth you'll be able to describe what this sad, cray man must be goin g through. His feelings, his thoughts, his expectations, what this decision will mean for his familyyou know, the general stuff of human life. -ut this story skips all of that in favor of a $ust+the+facts+ma'am approach, even when it does want to register some level of emotions.For example, check out how the prisoner's life is describedD )or the first year of his confinement, as far as one co"ld j"d!e from his brief notes, the prisoner s"ffered severely from loneliness and depression. The so"nds of the piano co"ld be heard contin"ally day and ni!ht from his lod!e. %& $n the second year the piano was silent in the lod!e, and the prisoner asked only for the classics. $n the fifth year m"sic was a"dible a!ain, and the prisoner asked for wine. Those who watched him thro"!h the window said that all that year he spent doin! nothin! b"t eatin! and drinkin! and lyin! on his bed, fre+"ently yawnin! and an!rily talkin! to himself. %& ore than once he co"ld be heard cryin!. 7).)@+)9 The stuff of feelings is all therethe guy 3suffers from loneliness and depression3, he is 3heard crying3 and 3angrily talking to himself.3 -ut the calm tone $ust sucks all the adrenaline and excitement from what could be a very moving bit of narrative. !ot only that, but we are clearly expected not to care about this one way or another, except $ust to note it as a plot pointcheck out how the description $ust skips from year two to year five without so much as a blink. That's three years alone in a room that we $ust gloss over with a 3eh, whatever.3 ?ou don't get much more matter+of+fact than that. Why so dry -ecause it's not the feelings that matter here. %t's the ideas that are front and center.
WhatGs (p With the
his characters and identify the good gu ys and the bad guys. &nd since that's the traditional function of the endinglollipops for the good, dunce caps for the bad, and a high and mighty feeling for the readerin ;hekhov's stories, the ending often has an uncomfortable feeling to it. %n the case of this story, for example, it's hard to know how to react to what happens in the last few paragraphs. The action itself is perfectly clear. Aoved by the lawyer's letter, the banker kisses the prisoner and leaves to go home, feel bad about himself, and have a good cry. Aeanwhile, the lawyer sneaks out of the room early. Finally, the bankertakes the letter that re$ects that money and hides it away in his safe as evidence. "o what's it all mean Here are some possibilitiesD
The After School S!ecial Ending The first possibility is that the banker has learned a valuable lesson about not being a huge $erk. There he was all set to kill the guy, when all along the lawyer h ad no interest in his money at all. "o the reason he feels bad and cries is that he suddenly sees that he's been way too obsessed with money. Which is fine, except for this tiny catchD has he really changed all that much if he still wants to protect the letter 7and with it, his two million rubles9
The E0il3Will3Alwa#s3Trium!h3%0er3"ood Ending /ossibility number two is that the banker cries from plain old relief. He's $ust so psyched he doesn't have to kill anyone and still gets to keep his money and everything is hunky+dory again. ?ay. This version fits with that last detail about the letter and the safe4 4 -ut what about the part where the banker feels so terrible about himself Why would that be
The 4)e#, %0er )ere54 Ending Aaybe the banker isn't really who we should be thinking about anyway. /ossibility three involves the other guy. How come we don't find out exactly what is going to happen to the lawyer 0oes he leave the room and go to a life of asceticism in some monastery somewhere 2r is he going to kill himself as =uickly as possible The whole %+re$ect+the+world business certainly could go either way, no "o, what do you thinkwhich is the most plausible explanation of the ending Why
The -et /lot &nalysis &ost !ood stories start with a "ndamental list o" in!redients the initial sitation, con(ict, complication, clima), sspense, denoement, and conclsion. Great writers sometimes shake p the recipe and add some spice.
Ex!osition 6nitial Situation7 1eath or solation8 The setup is pretty much $ust the argument at the partywhat's better, the death penalty or life imprisonment There are many ways to think about this, of course, and the guests offer up some the possible =uestions. For example, which one's more moral for a government to do 2r, say, what would a person be more apt to tolerate 2r, which is less painful -ut instead of going with any of these, the banker host and the lawyer guest really get personal, which brings us to4
ising Action 6Con9ict, Com!lication7 See :our .i0e And aise :ou .ifteen The lawyer agrees to be locked up for fifteen years 7even though the banker's initial ante was only five years9, and the banker puts up two million rubles. Who will win the bet For a while, looks like it'll be the banker since the lawyer is all miserable in his little guest house, asking for happy books and playing sad music to himself. &ce of -ase, anyone
Climax 6Crisis, Turning ;oint7 At the .inish Line The longer the lawyer stays, the more it looks like he'll be the winner. He turns to really serious study languages, religion, scienceand seems pretty okay in his makeshift prison. %t's not like he's ever gonnarun out of books. Aeanwhile, the banker loses his fortune and starts to freak out about coughing up the two million. "oon enough he decides to murder the lawyer 7hello, bad idea9. -ut $ust as he is about to do it, he finds a letter in which the lawyer says that he re$ects the moneyalong with the rest of the material world. He's really not a material girl, you see. !ow that's a twist.
.alling Action ;hew< =o $urder =ecessar#< The banker is relieved not to have to kill anyone. The prison warden later reports that the lawyer sneaked out of the guest house five hours before the fifteen years was up to forfeit the money, which gears us up for the =uiet finale.
esolution 61enouement7 The $oral8 Alwa#s "et t n Writing The banker takes the lawyer's letter, which proves that he re$ected the money, and stashes it away in his safe. %n case anyone comes asking = uestions later.
