General Zaroff is one of the main characters in The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell. He is an antagonist and was introduced about one third of the way through the story. His love for hunting and his unstable self are all shown through his words as well as his actions throughout the story. His passion for hunting relates greatly with Rainsford as they both love to hunt. General Zaroff tells Rainsford he’s read everyone of his book which also makes him his fan.General Zaroff’s experience with hunting has been with him since he was five, “When I was five years old he gave me a little gun, specifically made in Moscow for me, to shoot sparrows with.” This gives us an idea of how much of experience he has with killing things.
His love for killing things is also portrayed when he says “It would be impossible for me to tell you how many animals I have killed”. This really speaks out to us that he doesn’t care about what he’s killing as long as he get the joy from it. He also says “No thrill left in tigers, no real danger. I live for danger, Mr. Rainsford.” this makes me believe he had no more joy in hunting dangerous animals.
General Zaroff”s unstable self shown a lot when he tells Rainsford that he hunts helpless humans. “I hunt the scum of the earth: sailors from tramp ships — lassars, blacks, chinese, whites mongrels.”. This makes him almost mentally psychotic in a way. He
