'The destructors'.... Santiago Senties

‘The destructors’ is a really well written short story by Graham Greene about a gang of little boys in London in the mid 1950s during World War II in the time were the Germans attacked London using their air strikes also called “The Blitz”.

It is about a boys gang called “Wormsley Common Gang” led by a little meticulous boy named Trevor (“T”) who plans to destroy the only house that survived the World War II German air strikes with no damages meanwhile the rest of the neighborhood houses were destroyed with no mercy. This house is owned by Mr. Thomas and it is a two hundred years old house. He plans to destroy it from the inside to the outside with a clever plan with only one excuse to so such atrocity: it’s beautiful.

This plan was performed meanwhile the owner of the precious house, Mr. Thomas (AKA Old Misery), is out of town for a couple of days due to the bank holiday. The plan is to climb up his wall get to the inside of the house by the back door or a window and start destroying specific things from the inside of the house which would damage the main infrastructure making it crumble to pieces. To do such work they steal some construction tools so the work is not that laborious and they can easily destroy the inside of the house like worms through an apple. As they continue with the destruction of the house Mr. Thomas is seen by a little boy. Mr. Thomas returned early from vacations so the boy ran as fast as he could to alert them. Trevor, calmly and intelligently, decided they should continue with the work meanwhile he would take care of Mr. Thomas. He tricks him so he enters the outhouse and closes the door from the outside and that way they can easily continue destroying the house without Mr. Thomas being able to stop them. The house is finally destroyed when a supporting pole is retrieved and the whole building collapses. Mr. Thomas is left with a pile of building material and the boys are able to escape.

Graham Greene uses black humor in this short story to make it funny and entertaining by making fun of the misery of an old man in a cruel way. The thought of some cruel boys entering into some one else house and destroying it is just not funny except if you see it in a black humorous way. The boys are pictured as normal boys that eventually are jealous of the only house not destroyed so they just want to see it crumble o pieces. The way they do it is so perfect that can end up being humorous if you see the irony and black humor in it.