In the end of the story, “The Bet,” the lawyer despairs of life, and he reneges on the wager with banker. The young lawyer argues that life on any terms is better than death. In his hubris, the lawyer raises the bet that he can stay in isolation from five years to fifteen.

How does the lawyer provoke the banker’s decision to place the bet? The lawyer offers to give the banker two million if he cannot stay in solitary confinement for the agreed upon years. The lawyer proposes that he will remain in solitary confinement even longer than the banker suggests.

What do you think this says about his life? The lawyer takes the bet so he won’t be proven wrong. This says he is daring. At the beginning of the story they want the fortunes and by the end they don’t.

The point of the bet is that any life is better than no life. The rules are that the lawyer will stay on the property of the banker and will have no human contact for fifteen years. He can have anything that he wants involving music, books, entertainment, or food.

The banker wants to prove his point that the death penalty is more humane than life imprisonment. What is the banker’s motivation for suggesting the bet? The lawyer wants to prove that life imprisonment is more human than the death penalty and collect $2,000,000.

25 years old

It calls for speculation. For plot purposes, the lawyer had to be in poor physical condition because he was considerably younger than the banker. The banker plans to kill him in order to get out of paying him two million roubles.

Why does the lawyer extend the bet from 5 to 15 years? He believes that the lawyer would not be able to endure 5 years of voluntary imprisonment. In the heat of the moment, the lawyer raises the stakes to fifteen years. He probably does this to prove how serious he is, and how much he believes that he is in the right.