Once upon a Time

"He dragged a ladder to the wall, the shining coiled tunnel was just wide enough for his little body to creep in, and with the first fixing of its razor teeth in his knees and hands and head he screamed and struggled deeper into its tangle." pg 236
Once upon a Time
Nadine Gordimer

Upon seeing the title of this story I thought it would be a fairytale of some sort, but I was wrong. The ending was definitely not happily ever after with all of the conflicts resolved.
Throughout this story, the main literary device I noted was irony. The story itself was ironic because the speaker considered it a children's story; after reading this story I think we can agree that this is not meant to be read to children, since a child died at the end.
It's also ironic though because the people in the neighborhood were so afraid of burglaries that they were supposed to be protecting themselves with fences and barbed wires and such, yet they were really just endangering themselves even more. If they had not installed all of the fancy burglary systems and had been robbed, that robbery still would have been a better situation compared to the death of the son via teeth on the razor sharp anti-burglar fence. The parents don't seem to realize a burglary is something that's temporary; the death of the son on the other hand, is permanent. Which is the better choice in this situation...? Hmm

Possible themes in this story may be that you should be cautionary when someone warns you, but it should not take over to the extent where it can actually cause more danger. It defeats the purpose to try to be cautionary against burglars by installing huge lethal fences that can harm people in one's own family.

Finally, the words "YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED" apply to everyone, not just the burglars, as seen with the final scene of the son being chopped up by the fence.