Ambiguity Of Revenge In Ed Vegas Spanish Roulette

According to Mahatma Ghandi, â€Å"An eye for an eye will only make the whole world blind†. Revenge is a double-edge sword as it one is placed in a lose-lose situation. In Ed Vega’s short story â€Å"Spanish Roulette†, the central character poet Sixto struggles with enacting revenge against his sister’s rapist. In Francis Bacon’s essay, â€Å"On Revenge†, he discusses how taking justice into an individual’s hand shouldn’t be tolerated as it goes against the confides of the law of the land. Even though both Vega and Bacon implore the topic of vengeance, and how its integration has played a role in our society, the two offer contrasting views as to the moral ambiguity of revenge, its theoretical versus practical use, and the effectiveness it instills†¦show more content†¦However, as he undergoes this act of vigilantism, his actions are still against the law thereby becoming a criminal and according to Bacon, morally wron g. Moreover, in Vega’s â€Å"Spanish Roulette†, we are given a practical view when an individual is faced with the injustice that the perpetrator will get away with their action because the ineffectiveness of the justice system, as we’re placed within Sixto’s struggles within that time period. Vega states, â€Å"One never knew his own reactions until faced with Sixto’s dilemma† (Vega 507). As Sixto’s deals with the ambivalence of his suffering, as he struggles on whether or not to take action. As before the incident, he was a poet and a scholar; yet when placed into a quandary he chose not to partake in, his original philosophy of taking the high road was put into questioned. On the contrary, in Bacon’s â€Å"On Revenge†, it is an essay based upon a theoretical proposition as it acts in opposition towards revenge as it’s a selfish act that only seems to redeem the individual while going against the law and religio n. He states, â€Å"That which is past is gone and irrevocable, and wise men have enough to do with things present and to come; therefore they do but trifle with themselves that labor in past matters† (Bacon 339†. In other words, what’s done is done, and to enact revenge is to reside in the past, and given that the past can’t be undone, it will only eat away at the individual. Through this